By encouraging the use of private resources in colonization efforts, the Caliphate has established one of the largest interstellar empires. The local commanders are lords, and essentially “own” their colonies in return for providing resources and militia units for use on the frontier. The Caliphate’s colonies are organized according to a highly militarized feudal system. Laws are restrictive, and violators are punished harshly. Citizens are encouraged to live a simple existence and to practice obedience to their lords and the state. Below the Caliph are several levels of nobility exercising direct control over the larger population, which lives barely above the sustenance level and enjoys almost no comforts or freedoms. This vast theocracy is headed by the Caliph, who rules with absolute and unquestioned power. Though the jihad failed to achieve its goal of world domination, the forces of the Caliphate ended the Unification Wars in possession of a vast domain stretching from Western India to the Atlantic coast of Africa. Its terrestrial economy is perpetually bankrupt, and the government is highly dependent on the profitable exploitation of its colony worlds, which are allowed a significant level of independence as long as mandated production quotas are met. The Western Alliance is one of the strongest superpowers, both on Earth and in space. British military organizations continue to carry the designation "Royal" despite the fact that the monarchy was eliminated during the Unification Wars. deep space ground forces consist primarily of the Marine Corps, which operates alongside the British Royal Marines and other Alliance offworld forces. The individual nations maintain their own separate military establishments, both on Earth and in space, though they are commanded by a unified Joint Chiefs of Staff organization and are frequently combined for operations. Citizens have few freedoms, and speech, travel, and other activities are heavily monitored by the government. Superficially a republic, the Alliance is, in effect, an oligarchy controlled by an entrenched political class. Though their governments are a sinkhole of incompetence, authoritarianism, and corruption, the states of the alliance remain, at least in theory, the most democratic on Earth.
The occupied territories are not represented in the Alliance Senate. The Alliance also occupies Latin America and administers the area as a resource zone under the supervision of a military governor. This commonwealth arrangement is unique among the superpowers. The Western Alliance is a two-level federal republic consisting of the marginally separate but strongly allied nations of the United States, Great Britain, Canada, and Oceania (greater Australia). Crimson Worlds - Military Science Fiction by Jay Allan
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