All governments are run by liars and nothing they say should be believed. –I. F. Stone
From our point of view it seemed inevitable, the fall of governments and the rise of corporation-states. At the time, however, people thought the status quo would last forever. There were flashpoints of course, minor wars hardly deserving of the name. Nothing serious, however, nothing that would cause the downfall of nations, especially not a superpower like America. Despite all appearances, America was like a mighty, yet dying oak. From the outside it looked healthy, underneath, though, was corruption. Scandals rocked the government, causing its citizens to become cynical towards the government. America’s forces became more and more overextended in their peacekeeping missions. Their fine professional forces slowly began to be bled dry as not enough people volunteered to replace the casualties suffered and meet all of America’s military commitments. At home, several terrorist attacks caused the crackdown on civil liberties. All these were masked, however, by certain diplomatic “successes.” “Democracy” was being spread, by force in the Middle East, and through peaceful means elsewhere. The crown jewel of this policy was the creation of a democratic China and the resulting reunion of China and Taiwan.
All of these successes and petty failures were quickly forgotten, made into mere footnotes in history because of one catastrophic date, February 2, 2053. On that date, the American economy went into a rapid, deep depression, virtually annihilating the middle class. All that was left was a small rich elite and the mass of poor. The interconnection of the world markets at this point ensured that the repercussions of this depression were felt around the world. The fragile democratic governments of the Middle East and China fell to riots, as did the only slightly more stable government of Russia. In Africa, all national boundaries fell almost overnight as humanity went back to its most basic instincts of clan living for survival. America pulled back all of its military, sending them home in hope of quelling its own popular riots. It was too little, too late though, as the military itself disbanded, its soldiers having gone unpaid.
In the ensuing chaos, mighty corporations became the last remaining beacons of civilization. It wasn’t some high morals that caused this, rather it was humans being humans, the corporate elite seeking to exploit the situation for their gain while the poor surrendered their freedoms for safety. As ex-military swelled corporate armies, whole towns, and later cities were claimed by corporations or coalitions of corporations as their own personal fiefdoms. In this way, an uneasy peace descended upon America and those countries where events followed a similar model, such as Europe and Japan.
Once peace was secured at home, the corporations started eyeing the still volatile regions of the world, especially China. This interest wasn’t merely humanitarian, a desire to see a peaceful world. Instead it was motivated by pure greed. China, even with its recent civil wars, remained a large untapped market for the corporation’s goods. There was also the matter of safety as there was some concern for rebels seizing and using China’s nuclear store.
The “war,” if it could be called such, was relatively rapid. Direct warfare was eschewed in favor of bribery, alliances, and betrayals. Eventually China became subdued, either ruled by the alliance of corporations or despots friendly to them. Eyes were then turned to other areas, the Middle East and Africa primarily. Slowly, using the same tactics that proved so effective in China, the rest of the world was pacified, or at least marginalized.
When the rich wage war, it's the poor who die. –Jean Paul Sartre
I wish I could say at this point that things settled down, that peace, more or less, reigned for many long and prosperous years. I could say that, unfortunately if I did, I would no longer be relaying history, I would have ventured into the realm of fiction. It started with an invention long predicted by science fiction writers, the faster-than-light drive (FTL drive). The invention of the FTL-drive was the breaking of the last link holding humanity bound to earth. The population of Earth had spiked even higher with the advent of peace, causing overcrowding and squalid conditions. The promise of alleviating the overcrowding appealed to many. So too did the promise of adventure. Finally, the lure of wealth was like a carrot, dangling in front of rich and poor alike, promises of fortunes to be made. Like the fury of European colonization sparked off by Columbus’ discovery of the New World, the opening of other planets to colonization set off a scramble to claim new territories. At first all was peaceful. The planets proved large enough to accommodate several competing claims as corporations were focused more inward, in colonizing and terraforming their claims. Eventually, however, the need for cheap labor in the colonies caused the increase use of human cloning, causing colonization to expand more quickly and borders of rival claims to collide, often violently.
These clashing colonial borders threatened to undue the uneasy peace that Earth had enjoyed. Seeing the danger of a global war, which would decrease everyone’s profits in the long run, corporations agreed to meet in Bonn to settle their disputes. The result of that conference was the Bonn Accord. The Bonn Accord set the framework which later conferences fleshed out. It established the principle of Earth as a conflict free zone (CFZ). It also determined that the best way to settle new planetary claims was through limited wars conducted on the planets themselves. Whenever the planetary claims had been settled, either through military victory, alliance, or buyout, the claims would be officially recognized by the corporate community and the CFZ would be extended to these new colonies. To oversee this process the Interplanetary Oversight Agency was created, basically a later day corporate UN. Later, in the Oslo Convention, nuclears, as well as any other weapon that would cause damage to the planet environment, were banned from use in these limited wars.
Now a new planet has been declared open for colonization claims. Claims can be submitted to the IOA for approval. Once approved, corporations will be free to engage in any non-banned means they wish to support their claims. The name of the new planet? Some bureaucratic wag has dubbed it Ares.
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