Defeating a superior opponent

Day 1,546, 16:41 • Published in Slovenia Slovenia • by PatriotASR

The original article was published by Fight4 in slovenian, this is a translation for our friends and allies.

Vote and sub the original article: http://www.erepublik.com/en/article/premagati-mo-nej-scaron-ega-nasprotnika-1967128/1/20

Right now the main topic is the disagreements between Slovenia and the ONE HQ, but I will not be writing about that. Some of you know that in recent months I have said that the ONE command is incompetent and dumb in the area where it should be the most successful, strategy.

Anyone that has done any strategical thinking in his life can see the incompetence of the ONE HQ based on their decisions so far. In addition to that you can notice poor awareness of the current situation and the inaptitude to face the current situation.

In the article I will not be writing about what is bad with the ONE HQ, quite the contrary I will answer the title and give the ONE HQ a lesion in strategy.

Fighting a superior opponent

Right now the situation is that the first time since it's creation ONE is facing a superior opponent. Why the opponent is superior is not important, but it is important to know how to efficiently and effectively fight him.

The answer to this question is nothing new, it is an old military tactic called guerrilla warfare.

Guerilla tactic is currently the only option for ONE, even thou some still dream of defeating the enemy in a one-on-one engagement (If you saw the film Patriot you can see the reasoning). Open warfare with a numerically and economically superior opponent, that has a better strategic position and organization is dumb, to use a kind word.

The advantages of EDEN:

Organization: I think it was Romper that wrote, »EDEN learned organization in the era of strong ONE domination«. While EDEN adapted to the situation and survived, ONE is keeping it's head in the sand. I have to add that the EDEN forces relied on certain tanks in key moments and without those the strategy would not be nearly as successful, but that is not the excuse for ONE not to act.

Numerical advantage: Due to the proEDEN stance of Turkey, EDEN has the advantage and even if Turkey doesn't join EDEN it will probably remain antiONE and that means that the numerical advantages will stay with EDEN.

Economy: Without a doubt EDEN has a more stabile economy and more countries with all or almost all the resources. I will not count all the countries as you can see them yourself in the World Map, I will only mention China and Brazil, where many EDEN units have their productions and are almost impervious to the loss of resource bonuses. In ONE the closest to having all the resources is Slovenia, which says a lot about ONE.

Strategic position (geographically): It doesn't take a genius to see the huge geographical advantage of EDEN/TERRA. I will only mention a few, since I doubt you would be willing to read a list of all of them. The most obvious are the four isolated countries with all the resources: China, USA, Brazil and Argentina.
These countries are either geographically hard to reach (Brazil) or in the case of the US, very large and are very difficult to attack with any effect. The position of EDEN countries in Europe is also very important, because they neighbor the strongest ONE country and are weakening it with constant attacks, or in other words, keeping the strongest ONE force under control. A direct conflict with Serbia is not in the interest of any EDEN country, so they are using attrition tactics and ONE HQ is going along with it.
Don't worry, things are not as bleak as they may seem and as I already said the solution is in guerrilla warfare. I will now try to show the weaknesses of EDEN/TERRA, areas where our enemies are the most vulnerable.

Attacks to temporarily or permanently weaken the economy of EDEN/TERRA.
Any good strategist knows that the base for war is a strong economy. An army can not fight without food or weapons and with the lack of supplies comes the loss of morale. In RL it is even more obvious, but even here we can see that an economic decline is linked to results in battles.

Bulgaria is one of the strongest countries, but it is also a country with the most weak points. They are, of course, their borrowed regions in Ukraine and Russia. Without those regions Bulgaria is left with only four, without a real possibility of expansion. The loss of those regions would likely be permanent, since the shared MPPs would prevent Bulgaria attacking Ukraine and Russia.



The loss of these regions would also deepen the political crisis between Turkey and Bulgaria and as a result the EDEN alliance. Bulgaria would probably see their opportunity for resources in the regions originally held by Iran and since Iran has MPPs signed with ONE countries that would be the most realistic scenario for Bulgarian expansion.

At this point I will also remind you that guerrilla warfare is not only combat in the field (as most people imagine), it also a combat in the political arena.

USA have their weak points, maybe not as big as Bulgaria, but they have them. They lie in France where the US holds two recourses, that would be difficult to replace, because they share MPPs with the original owner – France.

One resource is rubber, the other is deer in Navarra (Spanish region) and it can only be reached (at the moment anyway) through France. I have also marked fish, that US holds both in France and Spain, but with the loss of Aquitaine they would only have the access to those in Spain and would be further vulnerable. It is unlikely that the liberation of Spanish regions would be permanent, but it is a great opportunity for harassing the enemy.

The idea is very simple and is based in the idea of breaking the enemy's supply lines, the RL example would be the cutting of railways in WW2, the guerrilla fighters then did not have the means to hold and defend the railways, so they disrupted them as much as possible.

In this game we don't have supply lines, but we do need connections to get the resource bonuses and if they are broken it takes almost 48 hours to reconnect (in ideal conditions). That is not an insignificant effect and in addition to that is also causes the fluctuations in the job and raw markets, which also adds to the enemies problems.



After the liberation of their regions the Spanish could employ an unusual strategy and attack Brazil, with that they would force Brazil to conquer their regions and in turn deny them to the US. It is likely that Brazil would give those regions back to the US, but again that would take time and resources.

Another weak point is in the Mexican region of Baja, where the US holds the only region with this resource and would be a great location for starting RWs that would divert their forces and that with the RWs in Spain would force the US to constantly propose NE against these countries (in the event there RWs would be successful) and by doing that extend the time without certain resources.

Turkey has only one connection to their resources in Asia and a very small chance to shift their capital. With a successful RW of one region Turkey would be significantly weakened. The other weakness of Turkey is in the fact that they have regions in many different countries, and with an attack on their connection region, RWs (which under normal circumstances would have no chance of success) in other regions would have a decent chance to succeed.



Greece also has only one connection region and as in the case of Turkey is dependent on a single region for their production bonuses.



There are also other weak points in other countries, but I will not list them all now, because that would take too much time and from the examples given you can see the countries and regions where guerrilla warfare is needed.

For any of the ideas to work you need organization. Guerrilla units are small and well armed, that have the mobility which prevents the enemy to track it and prepare a successful defense.

Units must be independent, but coordinated for them to be efficient. This sort of warfare would, in a short amount of time, significantly weaken EDEN/TERRA, with a series of real and diversionary attacks ONE mobile units would strike fear in all EDEN countries that have weak points. Attacks should come at different times and locations with the real goal revealed at the last possible moment so to have the element of surprise. Defending against such attacks is difficult and demoralizes the enemy due to the unpredictable nature of these kinds of attacks and the battle weariness that comes with attempting to control regions all around the world 24/7.
Even if the enemy organizes some sort of watches, they would have to be divided in shifts and would be outnumbered by the ONE mobile units that would be coordinated and organized.

Imagine a citizen of Turkey that has a few employees and not knowing if the next morning he would wake up to a country with all the resources or almost non of them. Imagine the costs he would have with the reduced production every time this would happen and the damage to the countries economy that would cause.

Focusing on Spain

ONE should divert economic aid to Spain. They are the only country with a significant increase in population, but there is a chance that many of these will quit due to the current situation, to prevent that ONE should immediately set up a daily supply of food from other member countries and distribute it to the new Spanish citizens.

The results of this kind of action would be seen very soon, because in the early stages development of new player is very fast - if they are able to fight on a regular basis. With a campaign like this Spain's strength would increase significantly and Spain would be a real thorn in the side of Brazil and could defeat it in one RW after another.

With this in mind I suggest that Slovenia by it self organizes help for Spain in the form of food donations, as much as we can afford – I am sure our finance minister can do the math of how much we can afford.

What makes a good strategist?

A few tips for all those would like to be successful strategists. Without following these you will leave every situation and battle to chance.

1. There is no strong army, without a strong economy
2. Always have two backup plans if the primary fails
3. Do not underestimate your opponent
4. Wars start because of emotions, but are planned without them
5. Stagnation is defeat, you always have to advance
6. Predict every possible outcome, that is the only way you will be one step ahead of your opponent
7. Always use deception and keep the opponent in doubt
8. Everyone can win, but a good commander wins with the minimal amount of resources used
9. Never show weakness to the enemy, he will use it against you.
10. Learn from the mistakes of others, the one you make might be your last.

There are many other things a good strategist should know, but these points are key to any successful strategy and that is why I wrote them.

With what you just read, You decide for yourself if the offensive on Romania is a good strategy (in which the ONE HQ sees as a strike against EDEN) or not. Romania is not a key country to weaken EDEN, at least not at this point.

ONE without leadership and organization

Realism is what is missing in the ONE HQ, living in an imaginary world will not solve our problems. ONE is not on the top of the food chain and it has to start acting with this in mind. For Slovenia that is not a problem, but it seems to be for Poland, Hungary and Macedonia. These three countries do not understand their positions and are suffering defeat after defeat.

The first step in the evolution of ONE is a change of leadership with people who have the knowledge and time to plan and execute a successful strategy. The second step is to organize the professional armies in all ONE countries and the third work on mutual respect, without which no alliance can be successful.

ONE should take Slovenia as an example and not despise it. Slovenia is currently the most powerful country ONE, believe it or not. You are probably thinking what am I talking about? Slovenia has certain advantages that no other country in ONE has. Slovenia currently has unity, political, economic and external stability, one of the best organized armies (professional and regular units), good relations with most neighboring countries, organized training and integration of new citizens, generous subsidies for building and (in most cases) experienced people in the leadership of the country. Don’t get your ego up too much, a lot has yet to be done and many things need to improve, but we can be proud of what we achieved.

ONE will evolve or die, the choice is simple.