After running an ongoing Marvel campaign for four years, I have found that the characters' run-ins with the government seem to increase as the PC's popularity increase (or even as it drops!). The proliferation of government branches, departments, think tanks, projects, taskforces, etc. almost requires the players to keep a scorecard of who their PCs are dealing with from day to day. ("You're Colonel Who of the what task force?")

Instead of creating a new agency every time the team needs to speak with the government, or, rather than relying on Marvel's creativity by using their latest government department (which proliferate almost as fast as the mutants themselves), I have created my own bureaucracy for the game. It is a combination of aspects from the Marvel Universe government, real government, and my own. This column lays the groundwork for the upcoming column featuring new characters for your Marvel campaign.

Without further ado, welcome to the world of politics in the Marvel Universe.

The President of the U.S.A.

The President of the United States remains a backdrop figure. He does not take any stand, pro or con, on mutant or superhuman affairs, allowing the decisions on policy to be made by the Congress and specialists. He will, and has, increased funding for special task forces designed to study problems involved with such groups and has recently ordered the active recruitment of such people for government controlled teams.

At this time, the President has remained relatively sheltered about situations involving superhumans due to cover-ups by members of his own administration. Some officials fear that active involvement by the President in such affairs could seriously hurt his and his party's elections, due to the serious split of opinion by the American public over mutants and superhumans.

Postscript: The President did authorize the use of Freedom Force for use in the Gulf War (see New Mutants, X-Men, and X-Factor annuals, summer, 1991). Several members of Freedom Force were killed or lost in combat, ending the government team's existence. X-Factor is the government's new team of choice. Sponsored by the government, it is tolerated as long as they prove cooperative; however, the President still prefers to use government human teams, such as SHIELD or the CIA.

Congress

Congress consists of the Senate and the House of Representatives. At present the House has had little influence or jurisdiction in superhuman affairs. The Senate, though, has created a standing Committee on Superhuman Affairs. Senate leaders remain firmly in favor of the registration of mutants, so as to be able to track their movements in hopes of preventing illegal acts by them. The Senate, as a whole, does not support such registration, but it remains deeply divided on topics concerning superhuman affairs and have used the Gulf War to shift attention away from this topic.

Committee on Superhuman Affairs

Due to the Senate being so divided over action on superhuman affairs, this committee has become an almost self-governing, policy making and implementation department. Very few in the Senate realize just how far the committee has stretched its power and authority.

The committee is officially sanctioned to investigate mutant and nonmutant superpersons (hi-tech, aliens, etc.) in order to create policies dealing with them: taxes, identification, legalities, etc. The committee ran for two years as a quiet and weak organization the relied upon information passed to it by other superhumans. However, in the last year or so that has changed drastically.

The committee now has a large and well-funded team of investigators, concentrating upon superhumans (not mutants). Mutant affairs have been left to the new Mutant Investigation Taskforce (MIT). The committee has a large amount of information dealing with most superhumans who have been active publicly. It was this committee' that sponsored the Superpowers Registration Act, which was to be required for all those persons who had powers and abilities beyond those of normal humans. The act failed to pass, and it should not be confused with the Mutant Registration Act, which requires the registration of actual mutants and did pass into law, but at the moment is not rigorously enforced.

The present committee seeks to hold onto its powerbase. Members within the committee have been using information gathered by the government organization for their own purposes (such as selling it illegally to the highest bidder). At the moment the committee is stalled due to a cut in their funding (money has been shifted toward other departments).

The members of the committee are:

Sen. David Young (D, NY) Outlook: pro-superhumans
Sen. Marcus Crawfield (R, MA) Outlook: semi-restrictive
Sen. Maria Lopez (R, TX) Outlook: neutral
Sen. Thomas Samson (R, CA) Outlook: anti-superhumans
Sen. Damien Lyon (D, FL) Outlook: neutral
Sen. Jordi Chamburs (I, VT) Outlook: pro-superhumans

Senator Young is the only member who works with superhumans outside of the committee, and has minor contacts with several New York City based teams and individuals. Senator Samson is suspected of being a member of the anti-mutant organization called The Right, but no proof of this has been brought forward. Senator Crawfield was once saved from a burning building by a superhero,but remains in support of restrictions on superhuman due to the strong anti-superhuman lobby groups in his state.

National Security Council (NSC)

The NSC prefers to recommend the use of the human government teams whenever possible, preferably SHIELD. However, it recognizes the problems and advantages of mutants and superhumans, so therefore it has adopted the following two administrative policies:

I. Support is provided to the Department of Defense (DOD) in its attempts to duplicate superhuman powers through technology. This means diversion of resources to the DOD so as to create new weapons that mimic or improve upon superhuman abilities. This includes hand weapons, battle suits, robots/artificial intelligence, defense systems, etc. At present, the DOD has proven unable to effectively accomplish these things, due to taxpayer scrutiny and opposition.

However, though quietly subcontracting to various private companies, successful work is being accomplished and the U.S. military now has access to a wide range of high technology items, though the quantity is limited and the quality often imperfect. Examples include: Shaw Industries (Sentinels); Genetech; Future War Technologies; and Stane/Stark International.

Due to recent cuts in the defense budget, many of these secret contracts with private firms have been discontinued or reduced. The U.S. military has presently embarked on its own projects, the most notable being a super-Sentinel for use against mutants, called "Project: Nimrod." Its expected completion date is not for another decade, however the research for the project has led to many spin-off, high tech weapon advances.

II. The sponsoring of Project: Wide-awake. Its support was cut due to the illegal activities of some of its members, so now the project has been reorganized to give the NSC more hands-on control. The NSC is considering replacing Project: Wide-awake with either the new Mutant Investigation Taskforce (MIT), or, the milder, lower-key Operation: Melting Pot. The decision hinges on the future conduct and results produced by Wide-awake employees.

SHIELD, The FBI, and The CIA

After SHIELD's destruction three years ago, the CIA expanded their operations and took over SHIELD duties in preventing international espionage, and to control superhuman groups. However, the CIA proved to be inadequate in this role and so secret societies of evil superhumans began to take control around the world. SHIELD was reorganized a year ago under its old director, Nick Fury.

Since its rebirth, SHIELD has actively fought and put down many of the growing secret societies of supervillians, yet SHIELD rarely acts on its own, preferring to work in partnerships with superhero teams or other international organizations (Interpol, the KGB, the WHO, etc.) to reach its goals. SHIELD is not the heavyweight it used to be, but it remains a strong force.

SHIELD has a very pro-superhuman policy and cooperates readily with recognized teams. SHIELD has an extensive information system concerning all public superhumanly endowed people. In reference to mutants, it remains neutral but is willing to take their side when warranted. Due to the recent assistance by mutants in governmental affairs, SHIELD will most likely assist them (see recent issues of XMen and X-Factor).

SHIELD differs from the FBI and CIA in that it is not required to follow the U.S. instructions or commands. SHIELD is internationally based, however, since the U.S. is an invaluable part of it and major supporter financially, SHIELD will probably honor most governmental requests.

The FBI plays almost no role in superhuman affairs except those that involve criminal groups such as AIM, the Maggia, Kingpin, Fourth Reich, etc. It is the CIA that actively involves itself in superhuman affairs, yet due to its failings over the past few years, whereby little of merit was accomplished against superpowered villains, CIA involvement has lessened, so now it merely acts as a supervisory organization for government superteams.

Project: Wide-Awake

Project: Wide-awake was begun several years ago as a commission to deal with the growing number of mutants in the country. The commission was to gather information about all known mutants, identify those that were threats, and create a means of neutralizing those that were considered threatening. Later on, its duties expanded to the indoctrination of useful mutants into government service.

The project ran unrestricted and basically unsupervised for several years, working with several companies and the DOD for the development of systems that could control mutants (the mutant hunting Sentinels). However, some of its members became over-zealous, and the project headed toward mutant control and ownership, rather than its original agenda. Also the commission became infiltrated with mutants who sought to control the project's resources (i.e. Sebastian Shaw, Mystique).

After several public and very costly mistakes that overstepped the project's authority and ignored legal boundaries, the project was reorganized by the NSC, which was responsible for slightly changing the commission's staffing, so that today the commission is merely an advisory board for the new MIT, leaving Project: Wide-awake to focus mainly on defense systems. However, some secret work still goes ,on concerning offensive weapon systems, and a few mutants still remain within the project unknown to anyone.

The present commission consists of:

Judge Petrie, National Security Advisor
Frank Lovwell, Director, CIA
Raven Darkholme, DOD (on a leave of absence from the DOD)
Valerie Cooper, Ph.D., NSC
Henry Peter Gyrich, National Security Administration operative
Sebastian Shaw of Shaw Industries (now deceased) Nichloas Fury, Director, SHIELD
Senator Robert Kelley, author of the Mutant Registration Act

None of the commission's members work well together and each has his/her own plans for the project; thus it is no surprise that the project is failing. An eventual power struggle is imminent, but in the meantime, covertly, the commission is still planning strategies for the control of mutants. The only pro-mutants on the commission are Judge Petrie, Frank Lovwell, and Nicholas Fury (and, perhaps, Valerie Cooper at times).

Mutant Investigation Taskforce (MIT)

This is the functioning operations branch of Project: Wide-awake. It is responsible for information gathering and doing small jobs, such as the apprehension of the weaker "superhumans," and is headed by Henry Peter Gyrich, a very anti-mutant crusader. The MIT's operatives are specially trained agents from SHIELD, the FBI, and the CIA. It is a fairly new organization and does not yet have many agents, yet it is well funded and has top-of-the-line, high-tech equipment.

The U.S. government is considering this as the new operational department for all mutant and superhuman affairs, so it is training its against and arming them as they would an elite, special forces military team. MIT has proven successful so far during field exercises, having defeated and apprehended several solo supervillians. However, they operate along the edge of the law and sometimes cross over, a fact which makes for disrespect and dislike among other superhero teams, especially since MIT has a reputation for prejudice, considering all mutants guilty until proven innocent.

MIT is young and can still change; however, on its present path, it is likely to be corrupted and used for illegal purposes. If their present success level is any indication of future performance, they will be a hard force to counter.

Operation: Melting Pot

This is the newest department dealing with superhumans, having been formed a short six months ago. It is a very small organization, consisting of only two dozen employees, and is sanctioned to investigate the possible uses of superpowers for improving the country and society. It is to formulate policies and plans on integrating mutants and superpersons into normal society; in essence, it is a resource development and management department.

Its uniqueness is that it is headed by an known mutant, Richard Blake, better known as the hero Sir Richard. He is assisted by several other mutants who work as field operatives, the best two being Rock 'n' Roll and Vigil. The other operatives are normal superhumans who see a need for developing a way to integrate mutants into the mainstream of society.

Funding for this new department has been steadily increasing as its successes grow. Its operatives have prevented several national conspiracies by supervillians and have gathered valuable information that other departments have failed to get. Also, Sir Richard has been actively recruiting the superpowered for government service on government sanctioned teams, mot notably, the teams of Civil Defense and Matrix. Richard Blake's superiors have been impressed with the small department's accomplishments and widely support it.

The department has a high public profile and receives generally good press support, both of which have helped to improve the stature of several mutants. It also functions as a pro-superhuman lobby with building clout, but as a result this has made it a prime target for antimutant supporters and for villain's plans.

Government Teams

There are presently four U.S. government controlled teams: Freedom Force, which was recently destroyed in the Gulf War, and thus is now inactive; X-Factor, still a young team but so far successful; Matrix, the most successful of the teams; and Civil Defense, a team of mutants and superhumans gathered by Richard Blake of Operation: Melting Pot. This last team is also now inactive due to the fact that its members are serving prison terms for a recent rebellion against government orders (see future issues of this column).

Matrix has been in operation for a couple of years and is supervised by a human named Christopher Hopkins, who was hired by the government. Most of Matrix's members serve on the team because the government is the only home or family they have (again, see future issues of this column for more details).

These government teams are housed and supported in all fashions by the government, and the public widely supports these teams, considering them a good answer to the problem of uncontrolled superhuman villains. Those members who choose to leave are allowed to do so, but most stay with the teams because they have nowhere else to go. Matrix is the government's favorite team and has proven to be the most successful so far. Unfortunately, the potential does exist for the abuse of these teams and for their powers to be used for illegal activities.

The government does not control, but officially recognizes and sanctions the Fantastic Four. The government tolerates the Avengers and X-Men.

Other Notes

Ambassador Gabriel Haller of Isreal (Amb. to the U.S. government) is a very pro-mutant and pro-superhuman supporter on the world front. She has served, and is willing to do so again, as a lawyer for mutants.

"The Right" is an anti-mutant organization that works through political lobbying and terrorism to control mutants. However, its leader is now dead and the organization's power as a result is waning. Its centers for development and research are still operative in Texas and Mexico.

"The Freedom Party" is a new fringe political group calling for the removal of many restrictive laws against mutants and superhumans, and claims that improvement of society can only come through unrestricted competition. Its leadership is rumored to have mutants and superhumans within it. This is a very radical group that might resort to terrorism if their demands don't receive more attention than has been given them so far.

Special thanks to John Kirk of the Kingsley Marvelites and to Matrix of the Hartwick Marvelites for this submission! Next time in this column I will feature some new characters for your Marvel Campaign.

This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web.
Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com