[ED NOTE: Paul's game is effectively an open ended world building game. He is doing free style open ended turns that are not really tied to one story. Consequently it has the feel of a grand epic unfolding before you. The central question in my mind is – will the revolution succeed? Time and a lot of bloodshed will tell.] Arguments 1. In response to Henry Fords siding with the reactionary army of Texas the workers of the Ford Motor Company riot and take over the plant. They unilaterally declare it a workers collective from here on to be know as the People's Automobile Works (PAW). Debs contacts them and then contacts the management of the small Auburn Car Company. He arranges for Auburn to send skilled managers to Detroit (its only 50 miles from Auburn) to work with the workers to make the company a success. (In effect Debs is allowing a medium size fish Auburn to eat a big fish Ford for the benefit of the people). It will be a while before order is restored but this action forms the model for workers collectives elsewhere. Workers rise, Debs helps find smaller companies with management experience who will step in and make the project work. The workers gain control and the manager's move up the corporate ladder by trading off over all ownership. 2. Debs moves his base of operations to the main radio station in DC. From which he begins to speak directly to the people. He sends out party officials to the major stations in all the large cities. One of the first acts of the new people's broadcasting system (PBS) is to begin broadcasting baseball games. Sports are intermingled with communist messages about teamwork and solidarity. 3. Debs recruits Franklin Roosevelt to take on the post of Commissioner of railroads and Communications. His job is to get the lines of communications going again. 4. Debs announces an end to sending troops to Europe and declares his intention to make peace with the Germans at the earliest possible time. The Federal Army greatly approves, as do most of the people. 5. A new show opens on Broadway "Red Sunday" Staring the Marx Brothers. It lampoons Kane and Debs. Groucho plays Kane, Chico plays Debs, Harpo plays Trotsky, and Gummo plays the people. They spare no one. Debs sends his congratulations on a wonderful show and asks them to do it live for the radio audience. 6. Huey P Long in Louisiana takes to the podium in the state house and delivers a tirade against Calvin Coolidge. "This man, no this WOMAN, declares himself president and then seeks support for the very powers that have waged war on our nation!?! Will you be ruled by yes men to the Kaiser? Will Pancho Villa be allowed to strut arrogantly through the streets of Baton Rogue? Not to mention Washington. No! I say NO! We must raise the state militia to oppose this foreign invasion. We must call on whatever powers there are left in Washington to send help from the rest of the country. And we must do this today!!!" The state assembly approves (they don't want in wet backs telling them what to do) so Louisiana declares for the USSA. The first state to do so. 7. Meanwhile in Hollywood Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks (all friends of the left) declare for the revolution and begin mobilizing actors into a powerful union. 8. Anti-Mexican feeling galvanizes Southern California (Especially LA and San Diego) against the Texas based reactionary army. Leaning them towards the revolution. Outcomes 1. 27th November 1917. Detroit Illinois. A pitched battle between strikers and Pinkerton agents at the Ford car plant leaves 72 killed and hundreds wounded. Driving off the bosses and Pinkertons, workers occupy the factory. Led by union activist and folk singer Joe Hill, the plant is renamed the "Abraham Lincoln Works". The Strikers later occupy the Illinois National Guard Armory in Detroit and begin distributing weapons. 2. 28th November 1917. Washington DC. The first halting broadcasts of the new Peoples Broadcasting System begin with speeches by Debs, Trotsky and Emma Goldman broadcast live to the nation. Despite the relatively small number of listeners, the speeches are repeated in local newspapers across the nation, bringing the CPUSA message into the smallest hamlets. 3. 30th November 1917. New York City. Former Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, today turns down the offer of the post of Commissioner of railroads and Communications in the new government of the USSA. Responding to an offer from Secretary Debs Roosevelt replies "I am a servant of the American People and any lawful government of these United States. The unelected tyrant currently occupying the capitol will never receive my support, or for that matter my blessings." Roosevelt later flees New York after his home is attacked by a mob, thought to organized by Eamon De Valera, recently paroled from prison in Ireland by the British authorities and now leading CPUSA organizer in New York State. 4. 30th November 1917. Washington DC Secretary Debs today announces his intention to "Unilaterally seek a peaceful resolution of Americas conflict with the Central Powers" and calls upon the soldiers of all nations to "..lay down their arms and take no more part in this wasteful war for international capitalism." No comment is received from the German foreign ministry but British and French troops in Europe begin making contingency plans to disarm the American divisions in the field. The American officer corps in Europe becomes more and more divided over whether to obey orders from the Debs administration whilst disorder rises in the ranks of the AEF. 5. 1st December 1917. New York City, Under orders from Commissioner De Valera, Workers militia in New York abruptly close down the Marx Brothers farce "Red Sunday" after one performance, and arrest the cast and writers. In the New York Times De Valera announces that "Control of ideology in the theatre and public entertainment's will be strictly enforced and monitored to meet the workers needs and support the ongoing revolutionary struggle". In support of this policy, De Valera appoints minor New York sanitation official Rufus T Firefly as Censor and Controller of Public Media and Morals in the city. 6. 1st December Baton Rouge, Louisiana Huey P Long, chair of the Louisiana Railroad Commission, declares for the revolution, taking a large part of the Louisiana Democrats with him. Long also launches a tirade against Coolidge: "This man, no this woman, declares himself President and then seeks support for the very powers that have waged war on our nation!?! Will you be ruled by yes men to the Kaiser? Will Pancho Villa be allowed to strut arrogantly through the streets of Baton Rogue? Not to mention Washington. No! I say NO! We must raise the state militia to oppose this foreign invasion. We must call on whatever powers there are left in Washington to send help from the rest of the country. And we must do this today!!!" In a telegram to Debs Long pledges, "my undying loyalty to this noble and heroic struggle." Rail transport begins to function normally in the state and troops begin to mobilize in support of the revolution. 7. 3rd December 1917. Hollywood California. The Screen Actors Guild today renames itself "The Revolutionary Actors Union" and pledges, under the leadership of Charles Chaplin, to evangelize the "new dawn of a truly free America". Work begins on several new pictures in this vein, including Chaplin's own "10 Days That Shook The World" In which Charlie the Tramp storms the White House and kicks President Kane repeatedly in the pants, and Douglas Fairbanks in "Zorro The Rebel". From New York, Censor Firefly sends his congratulations to the new union. 8. 4th December 1917. San Diego, California Anti Mexican riots take place, led on by rumors that the CPUSA local activists are planning to seize bank accounts to fund a massive jobs program as well as initiate a naturalization campaign for poor Mexican migrants. Widespread damage takes place as police refuse to intervene. Back to Table of Contents -- Matrix Gamer #6A To Matrix Gamer List of Issues To MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1999 by Chris Engle. 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