Shining Tomorrow Historical Lore (Part 4)

This series of posts will detail the backstory of the setting of my upcoming novel, Shining Tomorrow. This backstory is not needed to understand the novel; it is only posted as a supplementary bonus.

Part 1: The Late United States Period (1914-1950)
Part 2: The Norman Regime and the MacGruder Coup (1951-1970)
Part 3: The Rise of the White Nationalist Movement (1971-2015)
Part 4: World War III (2015-2020)
Part 5: Morning in America (2021-Present)

“No, Andrea, you can get through this…just ignore the flashbacks, it’s only a paper…it’s not like it mentions my family getting blown up…deep breaths. All right. Now to reprint the page.”

09/01/2015: Nationalist militias lock down major airports near New York, Baltimore, and Los Angeles to prevent evacuations of Japanese. Planes are also shot down with rocket-propelled grenades. Jasper Lowell vows to fight on “until the last foreigner is washed from our shores.”

11/01/2015: Leonard MacScott and his Ku Klux Klan militia defeat NAPA forces in the Battle of the Bayou, which took place in Louisiana.

12/25/2015: In a repeat of the 1930s war, many NAPA units defect to the Nationalists. They destroy Japanese forces stationed throughout the country and declare themselves the New Patriots. NAPA fights desperately, but is in dire straits. There is evidence that German special forces are involved.

01/17/2016: Emperor Tatsuhito of Japan declares a “Great Armed Struggle Against White Supremacy” and calls up a huge draft to defend Japanese people trapped in the NAF and relieve the collapsing NAPA forces. Fearing for friends and family abroad, entire schools full of boys enlist, as do many adult men. Many girls and women tried to enlist as well, but they were refused. Due to the huge influx of volunteers, the conscription plan is scrapped. The entire imperial economy is directed toward war production; the women and girls refused for enlistment instead serve in various war industries.

03/01/2016: The March 1st Offensive begins in California, marking the first landing of Japanese forces in the NAF since the war began. Over the course of six months, Nationalist forces are beaten back into the desert by brave new recruits.

10/10/2016: The German Kaiserreich declares war on Japan, pledging to support the rebel movement in the NAF. Great Britain and Canada follow suit, then most of Europe does as well, fearing a Japanese threat in the Atlantic. Mexico joins the war on Japan’s side. It was now a true World War.

02/01/2017: Japan invades and occupies Cuba to prevent the German-led coalition from using it as a staging area for attacks on the NAF.

05/09/2017: A Stalwart Youth troop thwarts an attempted German invasion of Houston.

06/06/2017: The Scouring of the Ozarks — In a campaign in Missouri, General Shin Kuranosuké has great trouble fending off resistance groups in the mountains. He orders his troops to shoot anyone who isn’t Japanese and isn’t an allied solider, not caring about their age, their sex, or whether or not they’re active combatants. His forces deploy white phosphorus and napalm all over the Ozark mountains, then do what they are ordered to do once people tried to escape the flames, completely depopulating the region.

07/09/2017: High on the success of this operation, Gen. Kuranosuké attempts to extend his assault to all of Appalachia. A German unit led by General Tomas Danziger, hearing about what happened in Missouri, defies orders and re-routes his unit to Tennessee to stop Kuranosuké’s advance. After sustaining terrible losses, his unit makes Kuranosuké’s forces retreat, and Danziger hooks Kuranosuké to the back of a jeep and drags him to his death.

08/18/2018: By now, Japan had advanced to the Atlantic. During that time, under German supervision, much of Europe — including the Catholic Church — banded together to construct a fleet of aircraft carriers and fighter planes. Japan and Europe spend the next two years locked in a desperate naval struggle as Germany sought to claim the NAF’s east coast.

02/08/2020: The first known giant monster attack occurs; a creature called Flying Executioner Sasaklao emerges from a Japanese aircraft carrier in the Celtic Sea and devastates southern England until it is stopped over London. Rumor has it that it was indeed summoned by Japanese forces.

[Mrs. K: That thing had a name? I couldn’t find it anywhere online.]

03/01/2020: The Japanese inch ever closer to Europe. Germany threatens a nuclear attack on the Japanese homeland itself. Japan threatens to “scour all life from the European continent” if Europe does not surrender.

03/28/2020: Cooler heads prevail. Japan, Germany, and their respective allies agree to peace talks in the city of Montevideo, Uruguay.

12/25/2020: On Christmas Day, the Treaty of Montevideo is finally signed, ending the war. The treaty does the following:

– Places the North American Federation under Japanese rule, but retains the Shining Tomorrow Party.

– Permanently guarantees the free migration of ethnic Japanese to the NAF, and specifically secures their right to own property in the country.

– Non-Japanese migration is also covered, with Mexico getting the highest priority (just below mainland Japan) due to the alliance. However, any migration not from Japan or Mexico may be blocked at any time, for any reason.

– Designates the area east of the Rockies, north of the Oklahoma River, and west of the Mississippi as the Middle American States, an independent country where the Nationalists may exercise their political rights.

– Designates Cuba as a territory of the Japanese Empire.

– Forbids the travel of any armed Japanese maritime or air vessel north of 45° N latitude in the Atlantic Ocean, thus guaranteeing European access to Canada and vice versa.

Since Japan ended up with a firm hold on the Atlantic, most historians say that Japan won the war.

[Mrs. K: You did very well here, Irma. It could be more detailed, but maybe less is more for this section.]