AK-47 Classic Plans

Because the best thing to do after failing to complete several wargaming projects is to start another one, I'm taking my first dips of toes into the waters of AK-47 Republic, classic version. It's actually been on my wish list for a long time, but I just recently learned that the classic version was available as a PDF purchase now, so I've acquired it.

One small order of figures arrived today, but more figures and bases are pending arrival, so I can't yet really put together my army lists. I do, however, have a setting background written up, and the names and types of the two sides figured out. I used the in-rule generators for most of the names, with a bit of tweaking. There's a chance I may change the name of the nation later, as I stumbled across someone else who had generated the exact same name a few years back. I ran a couple of the names through Google Translate to produce a Swahili version; if anyone happens to know Swahili and sees something Google Translate got wrong, feel free to let me know.

The MBU will definitely be classed as a Religious Movement army. Right now, the MUZ is classed as a People's Popular Front (Nationalist) army, though I've been tempted to redo it as a Dictator army. Problem is, while I would like to have the Professional quality unit the Dictator army would allow, the People's Popular Front really is the best fit of Political Maneuvers sheet for how I envision the group, with the caveat that rather than stirring up dissent against the existing government, they ARE the existing government. There's still dissent to be stirred, however, against the popularity of Grand Bishop Mbosa. Hearts and minds must be won.

And thus we come to the present iteration of the background story, which I reserve the right to alter or rewrite later of course.

Ztumsian War of Succession.

Once home to warring clans somewhere in the African savannah, there was little to draw more than a few stray explorers and missionaries to Ztumsia in the early days of European colonization. That changed when a power struggle in a neighboring European colony led to the remnants of the defeated uprising wandering into the region of Ztumsia and aligning themselves with one of the smaller tribes in the ongoing conflict, the Zaitu. The addition of their European firepower changed the course of the conflict decisively in their ally's favor. In time, their numbers grew with other outcasts, treasure seekers, and malcontents until they finally seized full control of the area. Unregulated by any colonial power, they eventually subjugated even their own former tribal allies. While treasure hunters gradually filtered elsewhere as Ztumsia proved to have few apparent natural resources, the white government still managed to keep an economy going with agricultural products, fees for protection of trade routes through the land, and a small but lucrative export of the native Ztumsian Spearfish as an exotic delicacy in certain European cities, gradually modernizing Ztumsia as much as was feasible to keep up with the neighboring colonies.

Inevitable discontent with the European usurpers would build along with increasing knowledge of western ways and technology through the years. The final straw came when a protest for greater rights by the former Zaitu allies was brutally crushed in a massacre that curiously became known even in Ztumsia by its French name, Pleurant de l'Zaitu (Weeping of the Zaitu). Some say the name was coined by a French nun from the local mission who worked tirelessly to help the victims in the wake of the massacre. This one event set the wheels in motion for reconciliation between the Zaitu and their former enemies, the Lbote. Within two years, the Lbote chieftain Noote united all the tribes into a full uprising against the white government, finally throwing off their yoke and driving all but a few whites out of the country. Now affectionately titled Papa Noote, the former chieftain estalbished a national government under his own leadership, with the chieftains of all the united tribes forming the Presidential Council to advise him, including a newly appointed chieftain of the Lbote to emphasize that Papa Noote was now a national leader instead of a tribal one.

This arrangement proved effective, providing stability for the new nation of Ztumsia that would continue not only through the life of Papa Noote, but would also lead to the selection by the Council of his only son to rule after him. President Sianog proved a popular ruler as well, following in the policies of his father, but his life was cut tragically short by a heart attack at the age of 40 and he died without having produced a son. It was this death without an immediate heir that was to cause a fracture in the peace of Ztumsia. The Council of Chieftains began meeting to select a successor, and for the first time they had to consider the question of who was worthy to be President with no descendant of Papa Noote available. Should it be another from the Lbote? Should other tribes have a turn? Should the Presidency be retired in honor of President Sianog and the Council rule directly?

As the latter idea began to gain ground in the public eye, since it offered equal representation to every tribe,  a new voice waded unexpectedly into the debate. Grand Bishop Jacob Mbosa of the Church of the Enlightened, a group generally regarded as a cult in neighboring countries but popular in Ztumsia with thousands of adherents, suddenly declared on his weekly radio broadcast to the faithful that he had seen a vision, and that Brother Isaac, one of the hand-picked elders of the Church and an up and coming warlord of the Mogate tribe, was in fact the reincarnation of Papa Noote himself, and the heart attack of President Sianog was a sign that the Presidency should be opened to the other tribes. He prophesied that from thenceforth Papa Noote would be reborn after each death into a different tribe, his identity revealed only to the Grand Bishop and his Elders, naturally, and would continue to lead the country forward in this way. His call for the faithful to flock to him and place Brother Isaac in the Presidency spawned an armed host with shocking rapidity, which the Grand Bishop named Mwanga wa Bure Urithi, Light of the Free Heritage (MBU). Faced with this sudden mobilization to armed conflict, the Council of Chieftains directed Ztumsian army general Ntebo to mobilize the army, which still bore its revolutionary name of Mteule Upanga wa Ztumsia, the Designated/Chosen Sword of Ztumsia (MUZ).