Vandarch Canal Crisis

The Vandarch Canal Crisis was a political crisis and, depending on the source, civil war which stemmed from a revolutionary separatist movement in Faneria from late December, 1991 through January, 1992. Centered around the Transisthmus region of Faneria, the conflict primarily occurred in the provinces of Culriocha and Ereglas, the latter of which bordered the International Zone surrounding the Grand Vandarch Canal. The Ereglasian Isthmus had been the subject of major territorial changes following the end of the Second Great War, leading to local resentment against the Fanerian government and the League of nations in general. In addition, Culriocha's distinct, non-Fhainnin culture, regional language, and historic independence from Faneria prior to the West Vandarch War had been a long-term source of seditious movements and occasional attempts at secession, the most recent of which had occurred during the Rose Revolution in 1942. The Crisis involved an armed uprising of Culriochans and aligned Ereglasians seeking a range of goals from regional autonomy like that held by bordering Namhe Province to outright independence; this uprising and the subsequent massive retaliation by the Fhainnin Army caused a three-week international panic, as it was believed by many political leaders at the time that the uprising may have been deliberately provoked as a prelude to a military seizure of the Canal by the Fhainnin government under the nationalist Gwyn Feawyr.

After the launching of an armed rebellion, revolutionary forces assaulted the Canal Zone, prompting an international scare and massive retaliation by both the Fanerian and other governments with interests in the Vandarch.

Background
By the end of the Second Great War, Faneria had broken ground on a canal in the Ereglasian Isthmus intended to allow its warships in the Vandarch to traverse rapidly to the Nordska and Kilikas Seas. At the end of the war, the canal and several dozen miles both east and west were ceded by Faneria to the League of Nations as an international mandate. As a direct result, many local Fanerian citizens were forced to vacate their homes or remain in the International Zone, which retained relative ease-of-travel with Faneria on both its borders but created numerous legal issues with the growing populations of stateless people While Faneria practices citizenship-by-application, a lack of citizenship made legal documentation a complex issue and the Canal became populated by a number of varying communities.

Nationalist radicalization remained an issue in Faneria after the Great War, with numerous terror attacks and political scandals as the right-Starkist wing that lobbied for continued hostilities with the Levantine Union was slowly purged from government. The most notable incident of these was the Bonn Hotel Bombing in 1956, when militants from the paramilitary group GaelWind attacked an Aenglish-owned hotel in Sethsport. However, Ereglas and Acanya remained a hotbed of grassroots anti-League, anti-foreign sentiment due to both deliberate efforts by GaelWind operatives and the difficulties caused by the relocations. The Fanerian government failed categorically to address the issues of the local communities, concerned with more intensive separatism in Lyukquar and western Culriocha.

Beginning at some point around 1970, a revolutionary society called the Ereglasian Guard formed with the intent of launching a guerilla war for independence, hoping to spark a general uprising in the outlying ethnic Culriochan outside of Ereglas and Acanya themselves. The group was subject to mass arrests from 1974-79, after which it appeared to have been disbanded, though the counties remained highly unstable. In reality, the Ereglasian Guard had recruited General of the Brigade Donnal Gwyre of the National Army of Faneria, who ran the local garrison and ran cover for the group.

Assault on the Canal Zone
In one action known as the Battle for Hill 101, a Yonderian six-man DELTA team held up and decimated a 200-strong element of the Ereglasian Revolutionary Guard for six hours. Despite facing two armoured personnel carriers and more than two hundred enemy combatants, the six DELTAs were able to hold off their attacks until they could be supported by and ultimately extracted by AMS-72 combat helicopters of the Marine Yonderre. At the cost of two killed DELTAs and the remaining four wounded, the DELTAs managed to disable an enemy armoured personnel carrier and kill or wound more than fifty enemies. The delay caused by the DELTAs at Hill 101 allowed coalition forces time to consolidate and prepare defences for the coming assault on the Canal Zone.

Fanerian Crackdown
Due to the confusion of the first several days of the rebellion, foreign press had perpetuated the idea that Faneria was attacking the Canal zone directly. While the governments of the other Vandarch-bound nations were appraised of the situation rapidly, it remained unclear to the public if Faneria's government was responsible for the attack on the Canal until the arrival of the Third Vandarch Squadron to the southern coast of Acanya, from which it began landing the Xth Brigade of the Xth Marine Rhon and conducting intensive bombardment of known militant locations. Successive deployments of ground forces to the Isthmus would reach a total of 34,500 soldiers supported by over a quarter-million naval, aerospace, and support personnel from across the Vandarch, particularly from the Urcean garrison in Hollonia and Diorsia. Heavy saturation of rebel positions and the siezed _____ Military Base totally destroyed the militarized vehicles and most of the rebels' modified technicals by the 6th of January, and arrests and capture of rebel outposts effectively concluded by the 18th.

Faneria
- inquisition into military brass

- rapproachment with Levantine Union

- beginning of full remilitarization, crackdown on separatist movements

Internationally
- trade disruption

- general improvement of Fanerian foreign relations\

- conspiracy theory that Faneria allowed or encouraged the revolt as a PR stunt (OOC: not true in this case)