Dios, Patria, Libertad ! A Dominican Republic Let's Play

Day 3 : The Lübeck of the Tropics

During the night of the 2nd to the 3rd day, the Savior had sent his army toward Panama. Panama had something the Dominican Republic was missing : food. Also, the Dominican Republic had something Panama was missing : the US protection or at least silence.

But something bought Panama one day of freedom ...



Nicaragua had landed an army of 6 militias and various support units right in South USA !

The Savior sent a plan to the USA, who looked confused about what to do.



Predictably, they did not listen to the plan, but won without losses nonetheless because Nicaragua stayed put.

Which means Nicaragua was presumably defenseless, just like Cuba. Consequently, the commandos were rerouted, as were the now TWO Dominican battleships !




There was indeed no defense, until some armors were met in Managua :




The commandos could probably defeat the light armors, but it was better to wait for them to come in the hilly area next to the city (where Commando have a large bonus), especially since an AT gun was coming as well...


And indeed, they came :





... and they were defeated. Regretfully, there was no image taken of the final defeat of the Nicaraguan army, but Managua was in Dominican hands by the end of the day, and it would represent exactly 100% of the oil production of the Dominican Republic until at least day 8.

As for Panama, it would be seized during the night by the sizeable Dominican militia. Much to the Savior surprise, there was not one combat, and the country was seized without a shoot. Apparently, the Panamean army was sailing somewhere when the Dominican landed.





Now you must wonder how the Dominican Republic could afford such an army. No, the Republic was not sitting on Aztec gold. Of course not, the Aztec were in Mexico, not in Santo Dominguo ! There was some gold that were spent between day 1 and day 2 to accelerate the research of militia before the night, so new research could be started (fairly pointless, since most of the time only one thing could be researched at the same time). Some 500 gold were received watching videos, but that's all that ever happened with gold until the end of the story


No, what made the Dominican Republic filthy rich was TRADING !


You see, the Americans, in addition to battleships, had sent economists to the Dominican Republic. Economists from Chicago. They explained the Savior what a spread was. The Savior understood that if there is a large spread between the sell price and the buy price on the market, that if for instance if the sell price is at 1.5 and the buy price is above 10, then there are some people who will accept to sell at 2 or let's say 3, and other who will buy at 8.

Consequently, the Savior proposed to also save the market by offering the best bid for people looking to sell, and the best bid for people wanting to buy. Consequently (day 2 below) :




And with this, the Dominican Republic became filthy rich. OK, maybe not filthy rich, but way richer than it should. Here is an extract of my "executed orders" book :




Sadly, it misses a lot of the sales at 8 or 10 or above, because the executed orders book has a limit in number of rows (or maybe time). Nonetheless, the Republic bought a LOT at 2 or at worse 3, some of which it would later resell at 8 or more, while the rest was used.
Suffice to say that using this trade the Dominican managed to fund its industrial growth without issue while building its two battleships :



The growth, as you can see, would be around two things : steel (because a navy was expensive in steel ; in any case most of the cities plus the Dominican hinterland was steel anyway) and men, because for a country like the Dominican Republic, manpower could run dry very, very quickly. Oil and food would be added to the list when Managua and Panama would join the Most Christian Republic.

The thing is I manage (part of) monetization in a competitor (loosely speaking) of Bytro, so yeah I know IronSource well .

Day 4 to day 7 : The Liberation of Central America

With circumstances putting Panama and Nicaruagua into his control, the Savior knew that his Call had been confirmed, even furthered ! The Meso-Americans were the same people as the Carribeans - poor mestizos despised by the white from the United States and considered still as colonial countries without the name. They gathered in small puny countries due to the manipulations of the Yankees, and certainly they dreamt of being united under a Christian Leader.

The Savior would deliver.

On day 4, the Liberation of Costa Rica started. The two battleships could safely bombard any militia that the hacendados would bring, the enthusiasm of the Dominican soldiers - commandos coming from the North, militias from the South - would triumph on the ground ideally without combat.



If there was an enthuasiasm that the Savior underestimated, it was the one of the defenders. As the Dominican entered San José, they were shot at by a surprising number of rifles and even field guns that had been built and then hidden. Losses were higher than expected :



Still, there were few things able to resist two battleships, and finally San José was Dominican !

"Weird", thought the Savior, "don't these fair people understand that I come to liberate them ?"


On the 5th day, it was the turn of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. Well, El Salvador had been thoroughfully bombed during the night, so really Guatemala and Honduras. The Savior had split his fleet : one battleship was allocated to each country.



Less than half a day later, El Salvador was invaded by sea while the resistance in the two other countries was being broken...

But once again, the Savior was surprise by the stubborn resistance of the meso-Americans. There was fighting in El Salvador, and the landing force was destroyed !



The Savior was furious, furious ! In a fit of uncontrollable rage, he forbade the press to report, and ordered the remaining countries to be reduced at ANY cost !

Due to this information embargo, we don't have any image of the last two days (day 6 and 7) of the great invasion, but we know the result : Central America almost fully under control of Santo Dominguo, except for a part of Honduras who prefered to join Mexico rather than being annexed by the Savior.



As for the loss, they were very high : one commando unit had been destroyed, one battleship had scuttled itself in mysterious circumstances, and the rest of the main army of the Dominican Republic (3 militia regiment, 2 field gunsbattery, 2 AA gun batteries) was a shadow of its former self now 60% depleted.



All and all it was extremely shameful. The Dominican Republic had been kept at bay for 4 days by a bunch of uncoordinated militias. With a better usage of the resources, it could have gone faster and with significantely less losses. But we had to soldier on !

Day 8 to day 10 - Grand undertakings !

As the Dominican Republic was still licking its wounds from the costly meso-american conquest, a huge news fell on the desk of the Savior !



Colombia, a country with great ambitions and poor impulse control had attacked Venezuela... and clearly the attack had not been overwhelming.

In addition to high losses, the attack had clearly petered out quickly.




This could be game-changer as it left both Colombia and Venezuela vulnerable from a lightning strike. Of course, Venezuela had been earmarked for re-christianisation for a while, due to all its cities being in range from a battleship that the Dominican Republic would happen to have. Still, maybe the Christian Republic should act faster than initially planned.

For its grand assault on Colombia, the Dominican Republic could rely on :
- 4 commandos
- 1 battleship (another one was being built)
- 1 submarine (protecting the Panama canal
- 2 destroyers (1 protecting Santo Dominguo)
- a 60% depleted stack of 3 militas, 1 AT gun and 2 AA guns.

And that was all.

And the Savior Said : "I think I can work with this".

Indeed, there were a few peculiarities of Colombia that the Christian Republiccould use. First, Colombia had received significant losses already again Venezuela, and most of the force would be on front, not guarding the rear. In addition 3 of the 3 Colombian cities could be bombarded from the sea. The only one "safe" was the capital.

Therefore, here was the plan :



- 2 spies would be deployed one on the frontline, one in Bogota to see what kind of force Colombia had
- Invisible commandos would be deployed from Panama. The would walk through the mountains south of Medellin ("Manizales") and from there march directly to Bogota before it could be reinforced. Between Manizales and Bogota, the march would take 1 hour maximum, not giving any time to reinforce to the enemy. For this reason, there would be presumably 1, maximum 2 units in defense.
- The depleted militia army would land North with support from the battleship. Losing this army was not seeing as much of a problem - it was costing no less than 15%-20% of the country food output in maintenance alone !


Of course, this meant improving the commandos : an expensive but necessary change :




Of course, the plan did not survive reality and the Savior impatience. More critically, a STRONG armored force was detected by the spies in Medellin, a force that could destroy the commandos, which meant it had to be destroyed, which meant the battleships had to be rerouted to clear the way from the commando - starting the war as soon as day 8, rather than day 9 as expected :




Early day 9, the armors were either destroyed or in flight. The commandos started the move toward Bogota :





In the North, the landing had proceeded normally, and the militia army was moving toward Barraquilla, with the OCS Toussaint Louverture on its way to support .


As hoped, Bogota was not defended - that artillery would not see the commandos until too late :





By mid-day, Colombia had lost all its core cities, with only the former Venezuelian city of San Cristobal in its hands - even then San Cristobal was under fire from the OCS Toussaint Louverture from Lake Maracaibo.






The heights of San Cristobal were defended by artillery. The militia of Santo Dominguo, raised to defend its country against the Haitians, was ordered to attack relentless. What they did not know was that they were now considered a burden for the project of the Savior. They, who had fought relentlessly in 7 different countries, had been ordered a foolish order that could only result in their destruction. They were a relic of the past, useless certainly, and costly too.






The militia army was virtually eliminated.


In the South, it was time for mop-up. Sadly, one of the commando regiment encountered an enemy tank regiment, and they were annihilated.





By the end of day 9, the total Dominican army was :

- 2 battleships - one in production
- 3 destroyers (1 protecting Santo Domingo still)
- 1 submarine (protecting the Panama canal)
- 3 commandos
- 1 motorized infantry (in the Dominican republic itself)


At least, maintenance was not much of an issue.

Due to his limitation, the final mop-up of Colombia would have to wait - there was no way for instance to destroy the artillery protecting the access to San Cristobal - though it was only one battery.

In addition, there were other pressing matters :

- In Europe, an unexpected alliance of Romania, Persia and Turkey was taking over Eastern Europe, destroying Poland and warring against the Soviet Union. Germany, France and the United Kingdom were totally inactive.



- More worryingly, in Asia, Japan had defeated China, and was on the verge of occupying it entirely. The Chinese government had fled to Mongolia



Japan was on the verge of becoming a superpower.

In America, USA had declared it wanted no parts in the International Diplomacy and became inactive. It had been replaced by Australia.


The Dominican Republic knew that Japan was definitly not Christians, unlike the Dutch, the Canadians and the Australians (though those were the wrong kind of Christian), so the Savior knew he had to organize them against Japan.




Australia was eager. Its country had been industrialized. Its army and fleet was modern and well organized !


Netherlands maybe needed some convincing ? And Canada some, errr, explanations ?








Well, Netherlands was also eager. Canada, eh, it was being Canadian about this whole "war" thing.



The Dominican Republic first explained its initial plan :



But it was maybe a tad complicated given the coordination issues, so it did not show the nice map it had prepared :



Netherlands had the largest fleet, though it was certainly not modern. Even old ships could scout in peacetime though :




On the other hand, Canada had not developed its fleet from the peace era :





There was a strong sense of herding cats, and the Dominican-Canadian-Dutch-Australian (DCDA) Command coordination was not looking good.

For this reason, the complex plan gave place to something more simple, known as the "fat multinational stack" :





There was another issue : Canada and to a lower extent Netherlands were lacking behind in terms of industry :





They did not quite realize it





Well, just like that the DCDA Command became the DDA Command against Japan. But at least Canada committed to industrialize from then on, and it did. So did Netherlands, though unlike Canada it had started on its own, and was more lackluster in the "army modernization" department.


In any case, the Dominican Republic had made a promise, and it had to deliver. On the 10th day, the small Dominican fleet (2 battleships 2 destroyers) was sent, along with the motorized infantry in Santo Domingo and the commandos in Colombia (seen regrouped before embarking below) :





Colombia was not finished off, but the Dominican Republic had to contribute to the defeat of Japan even symbolically for the coalition to hold. The conquest of the rest of Colombia would wait for the new modern army that the Christian Republic was now building with the many resources it generated through new trade, which will be explained in the future days.

As for the Japanese invasion force, it would take it 2 days and half to arrive in the general Japanese area.