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CURRAHEE!

In the days since Krapis has been elected CP, I enjoyed the opportunity to play the role of Foreign Advisor, my role limited specifically to interactions in Telegram. I share those duties with zRTx and Carlos3K. (Chickensguys was initially also very helpful in getting me sorted out and for that he has my gratitude).

My task on TG was to make sure eUSA was upholding our side of the Training War bargains, a task that would have been impossible without the vigilance and commitment of zRTx in particular. eUSA owes him a debt of gratitude.

My duties put me into daily contact with Asteria officials from around the eWorld (and from around the real world! How exciting!) As a 5-time CP (and 2-time Dictator), I have had some experience with foriegn diplomacy, but never have I ever had the experiences like I am having now. Telegram is constantly buzzing with activity - decisions being called for on dozens and dozens of Training Wars around the clock.

At the center of all of this activity is one person. He is the Supreme Commander of Asteria, Panda monium.


Panda



As I have watched the debates about how our current administration is playing out the terms of our NAP, one thing has been missing: the actual voice of Asteria HQ.

It is one thing to accuse a president of being a pompous ass, which he probably is. It is another thing to treat that accusation as evidence against his policy. So instead of judging our current policy based on your like or dislike of President Krapis, I’ll invite you to get acquainted with the primary personality behind Asteria’s HQ, the Panda himself. Panda granted me some time away from his busy duties directing all those battles to answer the questions that I hoped would help eUSA gain an understanding into this alliance which was once our bitter rival.




Greetings, Panda. Thank you for your time. It has been a true learning experience these past two months as I’ve watched you work. In the following questions, I hope to help my readers get to know you a little better, learn a little about the culture and ethos of Asteria, and hopefully come away with respect for you. You have certainly earned mine.


Gnilraps:
What is your official title in the Asteria alliance?

Panda:
My official title is SC, or Supreme Commander.

Gnilraps:
Describe the responsibilities attached to this title.

Panda:
Basically it's the traditional role and responsibilities; I am in charge of maintaining our war planning and operations, pushing people to fight and coordinating presidents/defence ministers in our joint operations. In the past I was also responsible for maintaining the trains we had over Hungary, Croatia, Slovenia, Turkey, Argentina, Brazil and France.

Gnilraps:
I’m happy eUSA didn’t get added to that list, it was a close call.


Gnilraps:
How many open war fronts (both real and training) are you keeping track of at this moment? How many people do you have assisting you in these operations?

Panda:
We dont ever bother to track training wars of Asteria or proasteria, this is the responsibility of each country’s government to do. In relation to real wars, well, as we are the only alliance who looks for war, we simply follow our own wars. They tend to last a few days before the enemy gives up, has no regions left, or asks for peace. We have a team of 4 people to make sure that we have full coverage in the day and night, and my team and I are basically all equals, although because I am officially in charge if things go wrong I take the blame, and when they go right I get the credit 🙂

Gnilraps:
Your answer is humble. I have seen you personally involved in answering questions about TW’s, particularly when changing circumstances requires regional adjustments to be made. You guys do a great job.


Gnilraps:
What is Asteria’s opinion about the military strengths of eUSA? Please comment on our coordination, our ground strength, our air strength, and how significant Asteria considers eUSA overall as a military power…

Panda:
In relation to your full strength, I can base this on a few factors. For your number of XX (edit: Level 20 Legends), you are below most Asteria, so you are not really at the top of the list there. For your number of mavericks (edit: soldiers able to impact all four divisions in a ground battle), you are actually the biggest country in the world; but obviously some of these are people with USA CS for economic reasons, some are just farmers so I cannot know your true number of ‘fighters’. To summarise, in ground I can think back to the serbia-usa war when we kicked CODE from your regions. You have enough power to cause some headaches, and probably you could beat mid-rank powers of Asteria such as Peru, Iran, Italy etc. Air is different. Even when Serbia focused only on USA air rounds we would have to almost go full strength to beat you. So i would say you are mid level ground, top level air.

In relation to your position as a ‘military power’ I think our relationship is not yet deep enough for me to comment properly. I do not know your politics (except wild owl sucks) and this is an important part of assessing someone's military power. I am sure I will get the chance to spend more time with your government and military commanders to understand this deeper. However, as a military group, I would say you seem to be well coordinated and organised, you joined our recent operation against Brazil, and had no real issues in beating them at any time of the day. You also have, at least in recent governments, shown you are similar to the rest of Asteria in your appetite for war: the game is not just to make TW epics and farm your 9 gold per d123 every round. This gold should be put to good use, and groups of us coordinating our damage together can lead to great things. This is the main underlying ethos of Asteria: TW is how we build our strength (or recover it), and it's why I was adamant to Brazil that (eUSA) must have TW as part of the deal with them because the basic understanding of Asteria is that TW is a tool and benefit that should be given to those who fight (not those who win or those who lose).

Gnilraps:
I hope my readers will pay careful attention to your answer. You have stated very clear facts based on game mechanics. Your evaluation of eUSA is quite fair, and I hope you will continue to be impressed with our politics. Your answer also reveals what I have learned to appreciate about Asteria, namely that you honor those who fight hard. These are the details I have communicated back to President Krapis’ Cabinet and I believe these are the reasons why our political machinations (Executive and Congress) have cause eUSA to move decidedly in your direction. Thank you for your candor.


Gnilraps:
I have played a long time, so I remember that Serbia was not always closely allied with Romania. What has been the major factor in these two great powers becoming good partners for such a long time?

Panda:
I think I can summarise that by talking about relations between the most recent Romanian and Serbian governments. We are both the same faces who have been in government for many months, in fact probably most of this year. To summarise our relationship and why we remain together, it is quite simple. When Romania asks for strategic or military help, we do it first, then ask why later. There is no congress discussion, nor is there a military commander discussion. We don't explain the situation to our troops, because there is no need to. If Romania needs our help, then we fight. The same is true for Romania too. In fact, sometimes groups from both sides will fight without the other side even asking, because they see a key battle. This is why our partnership endures, and why I do not ever see it changing in status at all: we treat each other not just as allies nor as brothers, but as fists that work in tandem to beat down on those who are our enemy.

Gnilraps:
I can say without equivocation that every member of eUSA strongly desires that kind of relationship in this game. We have never been treated that way by any of the nations we’ve been allied with, which is at least a partial explanation as to why we have not had something like that. But it is what we desire. I can assure you of that.


Gnilraps:
Please give an example of a 2nd Tier nation who has been given 1st Tier treatment by Asteria? If possible, give some stories.

Panda:
It is a common theme for new entrants to Asteria to be wiped by CODE or our enemies to punish them for aligning with us. Italy are 2nd tier in terms of regular damage, but when they need to fight they can be stronger than even Serbia or Romania in their damage output. They were royally screwed by CODE as punishment for joining Asteria, and as such they were given huge support on the battlefield, in organising their military and of course in protection and training wars.
Paraguay is probably one of the smallest communities in the proAsteria side, and since they became proAsteria they have been a huge target for Andes. We could not save them from almost being wiped, but we ignored all our other priorities to get them to safety. It is not a coincidence that they are safe in europe as well as in their cores - because we want to repay their hardship and faith in us despite the fact they are smaller and we could easily just ignore their problems; after all they have no alternative but to be proAsteria now that Chile/Arg consider them an enemy.

In both of these cases, I'm sure the governments of the countries at the time I’m talking about would explain to you not just the support we give, but also the messages from other countries governments and also troops: fighting without being asked or told to, but simply because they feel it's the right thing to do. It's no coincidence that Argentina is wiped, Chile is almost wiped and Brazil is wiped (and now with a peace deal) - because these are the major threats to Paraguay.

Gnilraps:
That is a convincing answer.


Gnilraps:
How important is the Real Life diplomatic relationship between Asterian nations and non-Asterian nations in determining eRepublic diplomatic relationships?

Panda:
There is no importance in this at all, at least to Asteria HQ. Using RL can be a positive and a negative thing. The real world and the erep world are separate, and should always be kept separate. I do not enjoy seeing RL brought into the game, especially as justification for actions against communities. But, I know that this opinion, whilst accepted by HQ is not unanimously popular, either within HQ itself or even in governments.

Gnilraps:
I entirely agree with you. When I play a game of Risk, I never think about real life diplomatic realities. I do not understand why people feel the need to do it in eRepublik and I hope it stops.


Gnilraps:
I spent the first decade of my life in eRepublik fighting against Serbia and her allies. When President Krapis asked me to be the point of contact between eUSA and Asteria, I was concerned that my previous reputation would be a hindrance. Yet you have not held my past history against me or against eUSA. Was there any hesitation in welcoming me into a friendly relationship?

Panda:
Not really, because even though you fought against us all that time, we still won Liaoning, and we won wherever we really needed or wanted to 😉

On a serious note, I think that the tendency for eAmerican players to fear eSerbia is wise: we are a tenacious group of people, and we would more than happily make sacrifices to punish or target people we feel deserve our wrath. Look at earlier this year, we had a war with Turkey and Croatia at the same time, both of them pushing with all they could. The smarter move is to ignore one and focus on the other. But, you cannot tell eSerbians to simply ‘fight smart’ all the time - their tactics and moves were tiresome and irritating, so we tried to win both. We lost, but the damage we caused to them was a big reason for their later failures.

However, back to the main point, everybody has fought everybody at some point. I cannot think of a single country we have always been allies with: the game and countries politics can change. I know it is common for USA to paint Serbia as a bogeyman that will eventually wipe you and kill your community. But we would not waste time wiping USA when Croatia or Turkey had regions 🙂

Gnilraps:
I appreciate your sense of humor and I hope my readers will be as gracious.


Gnilraps:
In eUSA, there has been some small amount of controversy about the NAP and eUSA’s good faith commitment to a permanent end to aggression against Asterian interests. What can you say to other eUSA tanks who have spent the first decade of their eLives fighting alongside Croatia and her allies, and who are not convinced that fighting alongside Serbia is a favorable way to live in eRepublik?

Panda:
Ultimately, words cannot change someone’s mind. Actions can. I can talk about the treatment and approach I have had to all USA governments since the NAP was signed, but I'm sure our reasonable approach and inviting nature has already been told to them; so what value can me saying it again have?

The simple thing to think about is the wider aAsteria existence. Hungary used to be in Asteria. Greece used to be. Argentina used to be. Look at them now. Just as our allies become our fiercest enemies, so our enemies can become our allies. Such moves require big words, and big actions on both sides. I feel I have started to make the right words and actions to show our intent, but how they choose to see or understand these is their prerogative.

Gnilraps:
I will repeat your words because they are worth quoting: “Just as our allies become our fiercest enemies, so our enemies can become our allies.” In my opinion, you’ve just described the great strength of eRepublik.


Gnilraps:
What message do you have to citizens of Serbia and other Asterian nations who are opposed to friendly relations with eUSA?

Panda:
Here, I think I will be blunt and maybe somewhat funny. There is a big difference between an opinion and a decision.

An opinion is like an a**hole, we all have one, and you shouldn’t let yourself be affected by others’. A decision is like wisdom, you might disagree with it, but you should respect its existence and try to avoid your ‘opinion’ making it dirty.

So people are free to have their opinion on friendly relations with the USA, but the decision has been made. Whether we continue to become closer friends, or remain just simply neutral to each other will depend on if the USA wishes to continue joining our wars, helping in our battles, and continuing to align themselves with our strategic interests. If that is the case, then it doesn’t matter what people’s opinion is, actions speak louder than ‘opinions’, and the wisdom in acknowledging someone being a good ally would overrule any personal objection that they would have.

Gnilraps:
We agree.


Gnilraps:
Tom Waits is the greatest living American singer/songwriter (according to me and a few others who agree with me) LINK for evidence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVGPPoc-wCU
Please turn our readers on to the best Serbian music you can think of.

Panda:




For anyone who wants to understand me, they can listen to this and will understand fully. It is my personal favourite song of all time, so of course that also means it is the best song of all time.

Gnilraps:
Now I understand why we get along!


Gnilraps:
Last question: I found out that you work out at the gym most days. As an avid marathon runner, I found this interesting in a fellow eRepublikan. Tell us about your fitness routine. Also, would you share your IRL photo with us?

Panda:

I don't really have a fitness routine, I just go and work on all the core muscles. Since working from home and COVID, I lost some definition so I focus mainly on the core and to regain my 6pack. It has been a beerpack for a few weeks now, but I am gradually returning to definition and muscle mass.

As for my photo, it has been leaked a long time ago, but here it is again;



Gnilraps:




A few closing words:

I conducted this interview prior to this morning’s war pronouncements were made, and thus the entire atmosphere was jovial. In the hours since war was declared, I have already begun to see Panda’s actions match his words. As a grizzled war veteran, I look forward to this current conflict and I hope we are about to write the next huge chapter in eUSA history, together with Asteria.

There. I said it.

CURRAHEE!!!