Carriers of Mercy

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Carriers of Mercy

meKharir aluRahman (Packilvanian)
AbbreviationmeKHARAH
SecretaryLuhayda Bedon
SpokesmanEron Dohal
Head (muSharif)Amhoud I
FounderStanding Committee of the Politburo of the Packilvanian Communist Party
Founded1958
Banned1974
Succeeded byBedonite dynasty
HeadquartersBingol (1958 to 1974)
Lehasa (1974 to 1985)
Membership58,567,000
IdeologyCommunism (1958 to 1970)
Liberal Communism (1970 to 1974)
Theocratic absolute monarchy (1974 to 1985)
ReligionPaxism (1974 to 1985)
AnthemMarch of the People (luQarul aleShabil) (1958 to 1974)
Noi Save The Nation (Noi, shalvaki lumulak) (1974 to 1985)
Politburo of the Packilvanian Communist Party (1974)191/415
Parliament of Packilvania (1985)2500/3200

The Carriers of Mercy (Packilvanian: meKharir aluRaheem) was an organisation established by Amhoud Bedon in his capacity as a member of the Packilvanian Communist Party to propagate Communism through charitable work and to transport Hominines out of Packilvania. It quickly turned into a faction that campaigned for Amhoud to become the next General Secretary after Thawal Yaladir. The organisation established a paramilitary wing and many members of the Communist Party were also members of the Carriers or Mercy. This gave rise to mass defections. The Carriers of Mercy was also dominated by the Bedonite dynasty, Magisterium of Paxism and former nobles who had fled the country or integrated into the Communist Party. It started the Second Packilvanian Civil War against the PCP and eventually overthrew the party reestablishing the office of the Sultan of Packilvania (whose first holder was Amhoud I) as well as the Parliament of Packilvania and was dissolved in 1985 and succeeded by the Association of the Friends and Veterans of the Carriers of Mercy.

History

Early years

Amhoud I, founder of the Carriers of Mercy

The Carriers of Mercy was established on the proposal and under the leadership and guidance of Commissioner for Reeducation and Indoctrination and member of the Standing Committee of the Politburo of the Packilvanian Communist Party, Amhoud Bedon. He proposed the organisation to the Standing Committee which voted in the affirmative. Some members of the Politburo who were wary of Amhoud's ambitions abstained from the vote. Dubious evidence that that they were anti-Communist sympathisers emerged and they were quickly sent to Reeducation camps where they died under mysterious circumstances.

The Standing Committee of the Politburo allocated a budget to the Carriers of Mercy but allowed it to raise funds from donations. Amhoud was given power over the running of the organisation. He proceeded to populate it with his supporters and Allies, many of whom were deposed members of the Packilvanian aristocracy and former senior clergymen of the Magisterium of Paxism who had integrated into the Communist Party as well as other members of his family who were senior members of the Communist Party.

The Carriers of Mercy laundered their allocated funds to invest in lucrative ventures abroad to generate an income independent of the government that they could use to coax members of the Communist Party to their side. They started projects abroad such as building infrastructure, spreading Communist propaganda and dispensing foreign aid. Their program was remarkably successful because many of the communities they assisted made noticeable and sustainable advances.

The Carriers of Mercy then established a policy think tank within the Communist Party that published reports and provided policy advice on foreign relations to the Standing Committee of the Politburo. Many of the leading foreign policy thinkers of the country gradually moved into this think tank. They circulated papers and pamphlets within the party. Their scope gradually broadened to domestic policy and they became a leading voice in the planning of the quintennial Five-year plans that shaped government programs and policies.

Outside of the party, the Carriers of Mercy received many volunteers who did Community work and helped to spread Communist propaganda within the country. The organisation was especially popular among the young people and students who met in small chapters to disseminate political ideas and who enjoyed the free merchandise, entertainment, food and alcohol that the organisation used to lure volunteers. The Carriers of Mercy cultivated a strong following. They established university chapters that drew many intellectuals who were able to filter their policy views to the Communist Party through the Carriers.

The Carriers established volunteer service groups for members of the armed forces so that they could do community service during their time off. Military jurors enjoyed sending ill-disciplined members of the military to the Carriers of Mercy for community service projects. Using similar tactics to the student and youth chapters, Carriers used gifts to encourage loyalty from members of the military many of whom were paid Poorly. Seeing the increasing participation of junior members of the military, senior members joined the organisation and a new think tank was established manned by senior leaders and military strategists who did policy advisory on military doctrine and circulated their ideas through the party and which in turned informed the policy decisions of the Politburo.

Many senior members of the Politburo joined the Carriers of Mercy due to the proximity it gave them to other powerful people through parties it organised where it invited only influential or ambitious people in party. It facilitated room for networking. It also facilitated an area where secrets were bought and sold by the Carriers and where necessary used to extort support from members of the Politburo for Amhoud's policies.

The organisation's marketing often featured Amhoud Bedon doing charity work. It secretly appointed a marketing consulting firm from Free Pax States that helped to build a loyal following behind itself as well as Amhoud. Although he was not the General Secretary, he often rivalled him in influence. His support and that of the Carriers of Mercy was often crucial for candidates to that office to assume it for themselves.

The Carriers of Mercy began acquiring weapons and inducting retired members of the military to act as bodyguards. This was justified by the fact that criminal syndicates were attacking their members. As part of a war on drugs campaign, veterans gave "military" training to young people to prevent them from doing drugs or going into crime and indoctrinated them with pro-Amhoud propaganda. The Carriers started holding mass rallies where Amhoud featured prominently. The General Secretary was often a guest further legitimising and giving tacit public support to Amhoud and the Carriers. The Carriers cultivated its bodyguard to secretly dispose of people who revealed internal secrets and to keep its members in line.

Members of the party often found that the Carriers of Mercy were useful in attaining positions due to their influence. So they often paid donations to the Carriers or entered quid pro quo arrangements, so that the Carriers would support them in internal party elections. Many Provincial, Regional and Local Party Secretaries had at least in part attributed their positions to the support of the Carriers of Mercy and thus often confided government secrets in the Carriers or did tasks for the Carriers such as providing government offices or appointed their members as policy consultants. The Carriers had worked over a period of decades to become a sort of "state within the state" (also known as the deep state).

The Carriers also spread their influence to law enforcement. But due to the size of law enforcement, their influence was more diffuse. The Carriers struggled to penetrate the intelligence services who were avowedly devoted to the main party leadership. The problem with the intelligence services is that they were prone to infighting due to jockeying for influence. They often underestimated the political ambitions of the Carriers and missed a lot of the illegal parts of their work. They were also reluctant to attack it due to the influence it commanded especially among Politburo members. Furthermore, the Politburo members who were also Carriers members also used their influence to restrain the Intelligence Service by obstructing investigations into the Carriers activities.

Civil War

Propaganda poster featuring the face of Thawal Yaladir

Until 1974, the Carriers benefited from the fact that the Communist Party had many factions and none of them were strong or united enough to challenge their growing influence within the Party. This gave them the courage to introduce and support policies that would provide mechanisms for their members especially the senior leadership to accumulate wealth and have more control over their private lives. This included relaxes trade barriers with foreign country, allowing for the gradual recognition of property rights and allow limited private enterprise, and relax pogroms against humans and to relax restrictions against religious communities. These policies were especially popular among the people. Nevertheless, an orthodox segment of the party began go oppose these reforms.

This was coupled with the fact that Thawal Yaladir was seeking reelection and there were rumours that Amhoud would put himself forward to replace him. Knowing that he could not hope to challenge Amhoud for control within the Carriers of Mercy, Thawal Yaladir co-opted the Orthodox Communist block and united them against the Carriers and their proposed reforms, so he could secure a second term. Prior to the conference, Thawal Yaladir, the Orthodox Communists and the Intelligence Services began coming after members of the Carriers of Mercy especially those who were part of the Politburo, through unfair trials, coerced resignations etc. Thawal Yaladir's plan was to get rid enough Carrier Politburo members so he could have enough Orthodox members so that the Politburo could order the disbanding of the Carriers.

Recognising that the Carriers were in danger and they could no longer simply work within the party, the Carriers declared themselves an independent organisation from the rest of the Party. This caused hundreds of thousands of members of the People's Liberation Army and the Communist Part to defect to the Carriers of Mercy. The Carriers of Mercy reorganised the defected soldiers and their existing veterans and bodyguards into the Warriors of Mercy as their military wing.

Shakar had become a stronghold of the Carriers as the Department of Reeducation and Indoctrination was fully under Amhoud's control and had built up a base in that province due to the Reeducation infrastructure it built there. As a result, the Provincial Government of Shakar defected to the Carriers of Mercy. The Carriers established a temporary government in Shakar in the city of Lehasa.

The People's Liberation Army sent forces to attack the Carriers in Shakar and they used the Trans-Packilvanian Train Network. The Warriors destroyed the line linked to Shakar, cutting the military off and killing thousands of soldiers in the process. The sheer embarrassment of the defeat, forced the Communist government to change tack. Shakar became de facto independent of the rest of Packilvania. The Communists tried to starve Shakar by cutting off supplies.

The Carriers declared that they did not recognise the People's Republic. They began exhibiting a much more theocratic approach and built a cult of personality around Amhoud, with the nickname Sultan being applied to him. The Carriers invited deposed aristocrats and clergy to support their cause, many of whom were wealthy and educated and brought back their resources to help Shakar defeat the Communists. The Carriers officially disavowed Communism and drafted a Manifesto in which they promised greater liberalisation in Packilvania.

This caused uprisings against the Communist Party which the Carriers supported. The Carriers sent their forces to conduct sabotage against the Communist Party. Party officials around the country were defecting. The Carriers supplied them with weapons and deployed its men to the defectors to fight against the Communist Party. Seeing that the rest of the country was falling to chaos due to the Carrier's influence, the Communist Party sent their airforce and missiles to destroy Lehasa altogether, this forced a mass evacuation of millions of people giving rise to one of the biggest sentient migrations in history.

Some party members were reviled by Thawal Yaladir's willingness to destroy millions of the country's Feline citizens for the sake of his position, so there was an internal power struggle within the party. This further destabilised the party's ability to respond and left the People's Liberation Army without leadership, direction or strategy.

This opened up an opportunity for the Warriors of Mercy to invade Jumhurikesh and seize military bases and nuclear missile silos in that province with PLA members and commanders either defecting or resigning from their positions. The Warriors marched into that province and effected an occupation. They forced the Provincial Government to hand power over Jumhurikesh to the Carriers who in turn appointed their own Provincial Government. Seizing Jumhurikesh was a massive strategic victory which allowed the Carriers to control the supply of food to much of the Provinces and leverage that to garner support.

Thawal Yaladir and his supports massacred over 50,000 members of the Communist Party, Intelligence Services and PLA who had opposed the destruction of Lehasa. This enormous loss of life, caused the Province of Ukanar and the military forces stationed there to defect. The People's Internal Security Agency (PISA) also rebelled against Thawal Yaladir and defected to the Carriers, handing over crucial intelligence and putting their men and forced under their command. This led to the People's Revolutionary Intelligence Agency (PRIA) launching a fight against PISA to control its equipment and facilities and intelligence satellites.

The Carriers invaded Kharyat and Ashura. The fighting for those provinces was heavy. The Communist Party threatened to destroy the Temple of the Restoration and the Memorial of the Jovian Gate. This caused even larger uprisings even in Mekedesh and Iganar. Millions of people were in the streets rioting and looting government buildings and publicly executing state officials. Law enforcement were powerless to stop the ensuing anarchy and violence. After some years of fighting Iganar, Kharyat and Ashura fell.

Mushroom cloud of the nuclear strike on Asmalan, Iganar

Seeing how dire the situation was against him, Thawal Yaladir ordered a nuclear strike against the city of Asmalan in Iganar when he received intelligence that Amhoud was there and that the PLA had him pinned down and unable to escape. Amhoud managed to escape that town evading the first and sole use of nuclear weapons in one's own country. Over 100,000 people died from the blast and the town of Asmalan was wiped off the map. This caused the remainder of the Communist Party to depose Thawal Yaladir and his cronies. They executed him, put Iman Erdahin in power. Erdahin dissolved the party and handed over power to the Carriers and granted independence to Tasselvalta.

Seeing the immense and frightening evil of the Communist government, the Carriers decided to reestablish the Parliament of Packilvania and called for the passage of a new Constitution. Communists, republicans, theocrats and monarchists formed the different factions of the Carriers of Mercy that were in the Parliament. The theocrats and the monarchists formed an alliance and called for a Paxism monarchy under the Bedonite dynasty with Amhoud I as the new Sultan of Packilvania. The republicans were weak and the Communists were reluctant to start another fight so they conceded and a new absolute theocratic monarchy was founded that pursued limited liberalisation in 1985. Many members of the Communist Party were granted amnesty and many kept their jobs. The PLA was merged with the Warriors to form the Packilvanian Armed Forces. PISA and the PRIA were merged to form the Packilvanian State Security Agency. To appease the Communists and show that the country had indeed changed, the Carriers were dissolved as an organisation and political parties were banned because the new government felt that parties were dangerous, seemingly dangerous enough to eradicate thousands of people with nuclear weapons.

Organisation and Governance

The Carriers of Mercy after it officially declared it's independence from the Packilvanian Communist Party was administered by the Supreme Council. The Supreme Council consisted of members that had last been elected in 1970. It adopted temporary provisions for the duration of the war whereby elections were suspended. Additionally if a member died, resigned or was declared incapacitated (by majority vote of the Supreme Council), they body could co-opt more members. Members could also be removed by a majority vote of the Supreme Council. The Supreme Council could appoint and dismiss the Supreme Leader by three quarters vote, but it never did so throughout the war. The Supreme Council had supreme judicial, executive, military, and legislative authority over the Carriers of Mercy. It vested most of the power for running the daily affairs of the organisation and overseeing the war effort to the Supreme Leader. Some of its members were heads of divisions and administered specialised areas of the functioning of the body. Despite a few members who vacated their seats for various reasons, the body largely remained unchanged since the Second Packilvanian Civil War began. The body ratified the Interim Constitution of Packilvania following the end of the war and the dissolution of the Carriers of Mercy.

The body throughout its life comprised of around 150 members however most of the decisions were made by the Standing Committee of the Supreme Councils which was chaired by the Supreme Leader and which de facto consisted of heads of divisions and made most major decisions. Strategic decisions that fell outside of the administration of the war such as the dissolution of the organisation were adopted by a quorate sitting of the Plenum of the Supreme Council (i.e., all its members) and it was chaired by the Chairman of the Supreme Council who organised sittings of the body either as mandated by its procedures or as requested by the Standing Committee. It was only mandated to meet once a month, meetings which struggled to reach quorum due to the vast distances and logistical issues that the organisation faced however members could appoint proxies to vote and deliberate on their behalf which was usually other members. This enabled more senior members to exercise disproportionate influence because that had proxy for several members who were unable to attend.

The Standing Committee of the Supreme Council consisted of members of the Supreme Council who were heads of divisions as well as the Supreme Leader and the Chairman of the Supreme Council. The Standing Committee made most decisions and met weekly. It consisted of 18 members. The Supreme Leader presided over its sessions and guided its activities and policies. With the Supreme Leader accumulating considerable influence and the development of a cult of personality around him, the Supreme Council morphed into a de facto rubber stamp for his decisions and the Standing Committee rarely voted against his decisions, resulting in the Standing Committee turning into a deliberative rather than decision-making body such that while members had oversight of their respective portfolios, the Supreme Leader made decisions for general matters.

The Supreme Leader was Amhoud Bedon who was also the Supreme Commander of the Warriors of Mercy and the founder of the Carriers of Mercy. As such, he practically had absolute control of the organisation for over twenty years. When the city of Adrien was captured, the Supreme Council voted to proclaim him the Sultan of Packilvania. However his reign in that position only started once the Constitution of Packilvania was adopted and the Sultanate of Packilvania was proclaimed. As the Supreme Leader and Supreme Commander his rule was absolute. Nevertheless, he was a practical leader with a relatively free hand and thus allowed the members of the Standing Committee to express their opinions without reprisal and to manage their departments with relative autonomy and he is said to have leaned on the Standing Committee for advice and direction and to the extent that decisions affected the entire organisation such as the attack on the Trans-Packilvanian Railway or the attack on Mekedesh, he sought his mandate from the approval of the Supreme Council.

The Divisions of the Carriers of Mercy were focused more around managing the organisation in a war time structure. Many functions that had nothing to do with the war were delegated to various offices and agencies while those concerning combat, security, and stability had divisional heads. The Heads of Divisions were as follows:

  • Head of Intelligence and Internal Security
  • Head of Manpower and Discipline
  • Head of Materiel and Resources
  • Head of Finance and Economics
  • Head of Health and Welfare
  • Head of Local Administration
  • Head of Foreign Relations
  • Head of Facilities and Infrastructure
  • Head of Logistics and Support
  • Head of Communications and Posts
  • Head of Food Security
  • Head of Religious Relations
  • Head of Research and Development
  • Head of Learning and Education
  • Head of Administration and Organisation
  • Head of Planning and Monitoring

In areas that the Carriers of Mercy took over and controlled, they typically placed combatants under arrest and placed them in labour camps. Civilian officials often retained their jobs to the extent that their jobs were relevant to the exercise of basic functions required for daily life and for which there were no members of the Carriers of Mercy identified who could fulfil those roles. The policy was to place at least one member of the Carriers of Mercy in positions of control and leadership to ensure that the administrative institutions of the places that they conquered were subservient to the Carriers of Mercy. Many Party Secretaries and other officials who were principally political appointees were removed from their positions and arrested. Because these areas were technically under military occupation, all the law was exercised by military tribunal under the Carriers of Mercy Military Criminal Code.

The Military Criminal Code was a set of laws that formed the basis of the military disciplinary and judicial system. Most matters which were considered crimes were adjudicated by a member of the army of the rank of Captain while a few members of the community who were trusted to the extent that this was ascertainable would advise on the crime. The Warriors of Mercy Gendarmerie was responsible for exercising basic policing functions. Generally, civilian police institutions were placed under the control of the Warriors of Mercy Gendarmerie.

Military

The Warriors of Mercy comprised the military of the Carriers of Mercy under the Supreme Commander who exercised control over the entire organisation. It comprised of the following: the Warriors of Mercy Army (which was responsible for terrestrial combat), the Warriors of Mercy Air Force (which provided air support and transport as well as air combat), the Warriors of Mercy Air Defence (which was responsible for counter air-surface missile defence), the Warriors of Mercy Gendarmerie (which was responsible for military policing and maintaining order in occupied territories) and the Warriors of Mercy Strategic Rocket Force (which was responsible for securing nuclear ballistic missile launch silos and other related facilities and prevent officials of the People's Liberation Army from causing damage using them).

Each branch of the Warriors of Mercy had a Chief Commander who was responsible for overseeing and directing it and ensuring that the force executed the strategic decisions of the Supreme Commander. The Standing Committee of the Supreme Council had divisions dedicated to the support and furtherance of the military effort. The Intelligence Division acted as the military intelligence of the force, the Logistics and Support Division was responsible for ensuring that the force and its materiel were moved, replenished and assisted where it was needed. The Materiel and Resources Division was responsible for procuring weapons, uniforms and other resources that were needed. The Facilities and Infrastructure Division was responsible for making sure that roads, rail networks, military bases etc., were provided and maintained to ease the movement of forces and people and goods. The Research and Development Division was responsible for developing new tools and methods to improve military objectives.

The Manpower and Discipline was responsible for recruiting officers and maintaining military labour camps. The Carriers of Mercy had approximately 7 million active combatants and a total of 22 million people served as part of the Warriors of Mercy at least once in their lives. A large part of the Warriors of Mercy was a infantry and mechanised infantry force that relied on guerilla tactics rather than conventional warfare. The force used everything at its disposal including civilian equipment to further its goals such as converting pick-up trucks into mechanised infantry assault vehicles and avoiding conventional battles.

This freed it from many of the restrictions that conventional militaries faced and allowed it to be innovative in the face of superior firepower and technology. However, the casualties that they suffered were enormous. The Battle of Ashmariya in Iganar had been a crippling blow for the Warriors of Mercy because the Packilvanian Communist Party used a nuclear weapon that wiped out 200,000 of their members in one go either from injuries sustained as a result of the blast or exposure to radiation. So greatly was the organisation dwarfed by the might of the state that analysts such as Umberto Fuolini argues that the Warriors of Mercy only won because of the popular revolts against the government that made many places ungovernable and amenable to the Warriors' presence and the horror of the nuclear strike on Ashmariya.

Fuolini and other such as Richard Carlyle, Sasha Vladimirovich Peskayevski and Li Tian suggest that the Packilvanian Communist Party only surrendered because it was facing an internal civil war and was horrified by its own war atrocities and its inability to administer large parts of the country. They argue that if the Warriors of Mercy and the Packilvanian Communist Party had gone on a one-to-one head on conflict, the Warriors would have lost resoundingly.

Military strategist Fudan Khuneyd, and Juan Carlos de Sousa Caldera suggest that asymmetric conflicts are by nature not designed to defeat their superior opponents through overwhelming force but through creating conditions that make it impossible for it to function properly. As such modern conflicts, especially civil war, are characterized by unconventional warfare approaches such as guerilla warfare, civil disobedience and resistance, urban warfare, information warfare etc. Thus, are by nature designed to achieve victory by attrition (prolonged wearing down of the opponent's will to fight) and creating conditions conducive for an ending by dialogue.

This, they are argue explains how the Carriers of Mercy were able to defeat the Packilvanian Community Party and yet how deeply they had to compromise. The fact that the Warriors of Mercy had to be disbanded and the Carriers of Mercy dissolved despite the fact that they were the nominal victors of the conflict demonstrates that the Warriors of Mercy had not won the war solely because of their military capabilities but instead through taking advantage of the dysfunction of Packilvanian Communist Party and its own voluntary surrender. After the war, the Warriors of Mercy was absorbed into the newly formed Packilvanian Armed Forces.