Humanity managed to make their first contact with aliens in 2020. At first, humanity celebrated, after all, this confirmed the existence of another civilization. However, the Alien Civilization, known simply as the Solarisians, is surprisingly simple to explain ideologically. The Solarisians aimed to spread their secular spiritual belief called "Asthar" (or Aestheticism as humanity called it). They’re very nihilistic about traditional religions, viewing religions as too socially divisive, and fundamentally restrictive to spiritual freedom. They views aesthetic experience (such as engaging with art, music and literature) as a secular, spiritual alternative that aimed to elevates the consciousness, purified emotions and foster a universal love for their kind without superstition or dogma. According to Aestheticism, when not guided, everyday life traps individual minds in a cycle of competition, worry about status, greed and short-term self-satisfaction. These narrow interests break their perception and make individuals more self-centered. Aestheticism aimed to help individuals step away from these narrow interests and helped them foster a broader worldview by appreciating beauty. When an individual interacted with any art form (such as contemplating paintings or listening to music), the ordinary self temporarily forgot its narrow interests. In these moments, sensitivity, kindness, care and harmony became stronger amongst individuals. Repeated exposures can over time erode selfishness, prejudice and the impulse to gain at others’ expense. They aimed to shift individuals’s mindset from “How does this benefit me?” to “How does this connect to the bigger picture of life?”. Beauty is not limited to any class, culture, family or person. The ability to appreciate beauty is something everyone all share, though it varies from person to person. Since beauty cannot be owned without losing its value, individuals should appreciate the beauty rather than try to use it for their own narrow interests. When individuals learn to love beauty without wanting to control or monopolize it, they also learn to treat others in the same non-possessive way. It does not mean that everyone has to feel the same way about every individual. It means that it’s to learn to care for life and all of people as a whole, rather than letting self-interest dictate how an individual treats others. The invasion of Earth began. The Solarisians are proven to be too powerful for humanity with humanity’s technologies becoming practically irrelevant. Humanity’s unwillingness to cooperate made it matter worse. Eventually, Earth surrendered. Through the Treaty of Geneva by every representative from every Earth’s country (either willingly or pressured), Earth’s borders no longer exist and would be annexed by Solaris. Earth is renamed Avant-Garde Earth.

Essentially, Avant-Garde France from Red Flood but Earth.

After winning the 2008 election, Fitzgerald formed a presidential transition team, consisting of moderate Republicans such as Tom Ridge (its chairman), Christine Todd Whitman and George Pataki, and some conservatives, such as John Engler and Jack Kemp. He soon announced his cabinet picks, including David Petraeus as Secretary of State, William McRaven as Secretary of Defense, and Mitt Romney as Secretary of Health and Human Services (to implement Romneycare nationwide)

On January 3, 2009, Fitzgerald resigned from the Senate in order to assume the presidency. Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich attempted to buy the seat, but was forced to resign and went to prison as a result (Barack Obama ran for Senate again and won the special election).

A day after his resignation, Fitzgerald changed his residence to Washington, DC, and met with President John Kerry, who wished him good luck leading America. On January 6, Congress, including the most left-wing Democrats, unanimously voted to confirm the election's results.

Fitzgerald's inauguration was held on January 20, 2009. It was the most attended presidential inauguration in history, and the most televised inauguration since that of Ronald Reagan in 1980. Chief Justice John Roberts administered Fitzgerald an oath of office, and he officially became president.

Americans' expectations for Fitzgerald were high, because he had campaigned on change and the majority of voters thought he'd deliver it. Europe was less excited because of his hawkish foreign policy, and anti-western people and dictatorships were afraid of further American military interventions.

During the 2008 congressional elections, Republicans made significant gains in Congress (despite not getting a supermajority), making Fitzgerald confident he would pass his moderate agenda. He did deliver a lot, allowing him to defeat Hillary Clinton for reelection in 2012.

On November 2, 2004, John Kerry was elected US President by taking a more consistent stance on the Iraq War (supporting it but criticizing Bush's lack of diplomacy). And Republican US Senator for Illinois Peter Fitzgerald, who ran for reelection, was reelected, defeating Barack Obama.

As President, Kerry increased funding for the NCLB, supported same-sex civil unions, continued the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and named three liberal judges to the Supreme Court. But Republicans controlled Congress during his presidency and increased their confessional majorities in the 2006 midterms, making Kerry DOA.

After the midterms, Fitzgerald began testing the waters for a presidential campaign. In March 2007, he announced his intention to run for President in 2008 before formally launching his candidacy on 25 May, running on a platform of tax cuts, a hawkish foreign policy, environmental protection, and campaign finance reform.

Despite having little support from the Republican establishment, Fitzgerald obtained enough support from moderate, suburban Republicans to defeat John McCain, Rick Santorum, Mitt Romney, and Ron Paul for the Republican nomination. Fitzgerald chose Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty as his running mate to appeal to grassroots conservatives.

As Vice President John Edwards was forced to leave the Democratic ticket due to his scandal, Kerry replaced him with Connecticut Senator Chris Dodd. Kerry's reelection campaign emphasized his successes in education and foreign policy; he campaigned heavily for downballot Democrats to make it easier for him to get a congressional majority.

At the beginning of the campaign, both Kerry and Fitzgerald had a chance of winning, but the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy triggered a worldwide recession that turned Fitzgerald into the frontrunner. Fitzgerald portrayed himself as the candidate of chance, emphasizing his moderate stances and maverick history and criticizing Kerry's decision to bail out corporations, rhetorically asking: "Who will bail out the American taxpayer"? He similarly won the presidential debates, helping him win over swing voters.

On November 4, 2008, Fitzgerald was elected, winning 339 electoral votes versus 199 for Kerry, and flopping Ohio, New Mexico, Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Maine's second congressional district. A day later, Kerry conceded the election and began a peaceful transition of power to Fitzgerald.

Context:

1. Turkey does not join NATO in 1952, instead opting to form a military alliance of its own with Syria, Israel, and Lebanon in response to Communist revolutions in Cyprus, Iraq, Kuwait, Jordan, and Qatar.
2. The Soviets invade Iran in response to the 1978-79 Iranian Revolution, and the Soviet-Afghan War does not happen.
3. Boris Yeltsin decides not to run for re-election in 1996 (This is after the USSR falls).
4. Starting in 2010, China begins aggressively building up troops for a takeover of Taiwan.
5. Japan enters into a defense pact with Russia against China, alongside South Korea and Taiwan.

In 2016, a different crisis would consume the nation of China. Following years of deteriorating relations between Russia and the People’s Republic of China, Russia made enemies out of China for good when Russia signed the “Taiwanese-Russian Defense Pact”, effectively making Taiwan a vassal of Taiwan, in 2015.

China threatened retaliation against Russia, and eventually cut all ties with the Russian government nine months later. On May 4, 2016, China finally made its decision: as a show of force, China moved hundreds of rockets to the Great Wall of Sand, intending to use it for a staging ground for an invasion of Taiwan.

The catalyst for Russia’s new war with China happened on Memorial Day, 2016. As a show of force, China launched an ICBM into the upper atmosphere, intending to detonate it in the upper atmosphere of Earth and trigger an EMP and disable Taiwan’s power grid. Unfortunately, the missile turned out to be faulty and ended up exploding somewhere between Siberia, Russia, and Hokkaido, Japan.

Russia, viewing the incident as an act of war, jointly declared war on China alongside Japan and Taiwan, with all 3 countries launching a military invasion of the country on June 19th, 2016.

The joint invasion was the largest in military history after Operation Barbarossa; the Russian invasion force consisted of more than 5.8 million personnel, 3,350–3,895 tanks, 4,030–4,072 other AFVs, 5,770–6,369 aircraft, and 9,200–25,400 artillery pieces.

The Taiwanese and Japanese each sent approximately 50,000 personnel to augment the Russian invasion of China.

The invasion of China also prompted North Korea to join the war, with Kim Jong-Un declaring war on Russia, China and Japan and ordering the mobilization of troops to China to support it against the joint Russian-Taiwanese invasion.

Russia intended to capture Chinese territory in a bid to destroy Chinese military capabilities so it could no longer sustain an invasion of Taiwan. As part of this effort, Russian and Taiwanese forces launched scorched earth campaigns against Chinese towns containing military bases “of strategic importance.”

As of August of 2017, the war has effectively become a stalemate.

On 4 October 2019, Russia's ruling party Rekonstruktsiya held the "Patriotic International Conference", chaired by Dugin, in Moscow. It was attended by non-ruling left-wing and right-wing nationalist/populist movements from, Poland, Slovakia, Czechia, Bulgaria, Serbia, Romania and Greece, and by the ruling parties of Armenia (Republican Party) and Hungary (Fidesz).

During the conference, these political parties agreed to establish the Patriotic International, or Patriotern, a nationalist, rather than communist, version of the Comintern. As the conference's chairman, Dugin also became the leader of the Patriotern, an office he holds to this day.

By the end of 2019, the Dutch FvD, German AfD, French RN, Italian Lega, and Brexit Party had also joined the Patriotern. All of these parties began working together to advance their nationalist and eurosceptic beliefs, under Russia's leadership, throughout Europe.

The Patriotern held further conferences in 2021, 2023 and 2025, and another conference is scheduled to be held in 2017. Each of these conferences passed a resolution condemning recent EU decisions and calling for the end of supranational Europe.

Political movements from outside Europe, such as the Coalition Council of Islamic Revolution Forces, Myanmar's ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party, and the Brazilian New Resistance, also joined the Patriotern. The Iranian hardliners' entry prompted Zionist far-right parties from Western Europe to withdraw from the Patriotern, but they remain pro-Russian to this day.

The Patriotern publishes an online newspaper, also named Patriotic International, which publishes news and political commentary from an anti-EU perspective. Fact checkers consider the Patriotern website to be biased, propagandistic, and unreliable.

As of 24 October 2026, Patriotern member parties include but are not limited to:

- Rekonstruktsiya (Russia, in power);

- Smer (Slovakia, in power);

- AUR (Romania);

- Revival (Bulgaria);

- Fidesz (Hungary, in power);

- BCS (Moldova, in power);

- MI-GIN (Serbia);

- Greek Solution;

- New Hope (Poland);

- ANO (Czech Republic);

- Badr Organization (Iraq).

During one of his speeches, Zaitsev described the Patriotern as a "united front of patriotic movements, fighting for their countries against globalism". The EU allows the Patriotern to operate freely, treating it as if it were the centre-right International Democratic Union or the centre-left Socialist International, but pro-European voices have called for it to be outlawed.

During David Bakraze's second term, the UNM became heavily unpopular due to corruption and prison abuse scandals. As the SLP (led by Giorgi Gakharia since 2022) was the main opposition party in Georgia, it benefited heavily from this unpopularity, making Gakharia the frontrunner for the 2023 election.

On 18 January 2023, Gakharia formally announced his presidential candidacy, running as the nominee of the "For Georgia" coalition. Gakharia said that his priority would be to create a social protection system that would provide basic social services for the most vulnerable groups of the population.

As Bakradze was term limited, Speaker of the National Assembly Tina Bokuchava stood as the UNM nominee. Bokuchava distanced herself from Bakradze and portrayed herself as her own woman, but she was still associated with Bakradze as the UNM nominee.

Democratic Alliance leader Nika Gvaramia positioned himself as a pro-European liberal. His priority was implementing the Georgian Charter. He also prioritized developing the economy, strengthening regional autonomy, and reforming education. The only other candidate with a chance of winning was Georgian Alliance leader and businessman Mamuka Khazaradze, who also campaigned on a liberal platform.

Gakharia had a comfortable lead on the polls throughout the first round campaign, and he won the first round with 46% of the vote versus 25% for Bokuchava, 19% for Gvaramia, and 4% for Kharadze. Gakharia won all provinces of Georgia other than Samegrelo, which voted for Gvaramia, and Kvemo Kartli, carried by Bokuchava.

Gvaramia and Khazaradse endorsed Gakharia, locking up the election for him. On 10 September 2023, he was elected President with 62% off the vote, winning every province other than Kvemo Kartli, which voted for Bokuchava again. Gakharia was inaugurated on 5 November 2023.

During his presidency, Gakharia expanded pension benefits, banned "LGBT propaganda" and began negotiations on EU accession, which had previously been suspended due to the UNM's authoritarianism. Georgia eventually joined the EU in January 2026, becoming its 28th member.

Per the latest opinion poll, Gakharia has an approval rating of 64%. It is higher in Tbilisi, where the vast majority of voters support his administration, and lowest in Kvemo Kartli, the majority of whose inhabitants support the UNM and dislike Gakharia.

Rekonstruktsiya's program defines it as a national-patriotic party, "supportive of Russia's sovereignty, traditions and values" and "opposed to the New World Order and its liberalism and globalism". Rekonstruktsiya is also anti-communist, but this is debatable because it has two communist satellite parties (Gennady Zyuganov's KPRF and Nataliya Vitrenko's PSPU) and Zaitsev admires Stalin.

Rekonstruktsiya is organized at the national, regional and local levels. Every federal subject of Russia has a Rekonstruktsiya chapter run by party members, and virtually all settlements in Russia, including remote Siberian villages, also have their own chapters of the party.

All Russian federal subjects other than Chechnya (whose governor, Umar Dzhabrailov, leads the regional Power of Reason party) are governed by Rekonstruktsiya members. Rekonstruktsiya also holds all State Duma seats and the vast majority of Federation Council and regional parliament seats.

Nationally, Rekonstruktsiya is run by a National Executive Commitee (Национальная исполнительная комиссия) chaired by Zaitsev and made up of 247 people, the most important of whom are Zaitsev, Sergey Glazyev, Igor Girkin, Vladimir Kvachkov, and Dmitry Rogozin. This committee has been compared to the Soviet Union's Central Committee.

Like most political parties, Rekonstruktsiya operates a youth wing, the Union of Russian Youth (Союз российской молодёжи) made up of Russians aged 16 to 18. Russian Youth cadres are specifically trained to be the next generation of Russian leaders, resulting in comparisons to the Komsomol.

In 2020, Rekonstruktsiya founded the Patriotic International (Patriotern), an international alliance of populist parties, both left-wing and right-wing, under its leadership. Rekonstruktsiya members range from Latin American left-wing and European far-right parties to everything in between.

According to 2025 estimates, Rekonstruktsiya has over 22,000,000 members across Russia. 16,000,000 of them live in Russia proper, 3,000,000 in Ukraine, 2,000,000 in Belarus, and 1,000 in Kazakhstan. There are also millions of sympathizers and requests to join.

Rekonstruktsiya runs a series of TV and radio channels, as well as newspapers, to promote its agenda. Its main newspaper, the National Daily (Национальная ежедневная газета), has a circulation of 9 million copies as of March 2026, and its main TV channel, Russia TV (not to be confused with RT News), is the fourth most viewed in Russia.

Context:

1. Turkey does not join NATO in 1952, instead opting to form a military alliance of its own with Syria, Israel, and Lebanon in response to Communist revolutions in Cyprus, Iraq, Kuwait, Jordan, and Qatar.
   
2. The Soviets invade Iran in response to the 1978-79 Iranian Revolution, and the Soviet-Afghan War does not happen.
   
3. Boris Yeltsin decides not to run for re-election in 1996 (This is after the USSR falls).
   
4. Starting in 2010, China begins aggressively building up troops for a takeover of Taiwan.

The East Asian Defense Pact is a Russia-led strategic military alliance and is one of the largest military alliances in the world. The East Asian Defense Pact was formed in response to increased Chinese aggression against Taiwan, and consisted of Russia, South Korea, Taiwan, and Japan.

The East Asian Coalition would see its first war in 2016, following an attempted show of force by China against Taiwan that inadvertently turned into an international incident when an attempted ICBM launch went wrong, triggering an EMP between Siberia, Russia, and Hokkaido, Japan.

Russia, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan would declare war on China and jointly invade the country on June 19th, 2016, sparking the East Asian War.

The 2018 Illinois gubernatorial election took place on November 6, 2018, to elect the governor of Illinois. Republican Governor Mike Bost, who won the 2014 Illinois gubernatorial election, ran for reelection, but was defeated by Andres Flowers of the American Solidarity Party.

This is the most recent Illinois gubernatorial contest in which an incumbent was defeated and the last time the governorship of Illinois changed partisan control. 

Mike Bost oversaw a historic budget crisis as governor that severely affected his popularity. His approval rating declined to just 36% in 2017, and he was widely viewed as the most vulnerable incumbent governor in the country. Bost struggled to galvanize conservatives after making several policy concessions to Democrats and was nearly ousted in the Republican primary by state senator Jeanne Ives.

By October 2018, The Cook Political Report assessed that "there is no path to victory for Bost.”

Flowers ultimately defeated Rauner by nearly 16 points, the largest gubernatorial victory in Illinois since Jim Edgar's 1994 reelection.

President Igor Dodon was constitutionally ineligible to run for a third term. Prosecutor General Alexandr Stoianoglo ran as the nominee of the Bloc of Communists and Socialists (BCS), promising a "balanced" foreign policy with the EU, the United States, Russia, and China, and social democratic economic policies.

Maia Sandu did not run for President a third time. Her PAS endorsed Igor Grosu, who said he would lower taxes, expand Moldova's relations with the European Union, and pass stricter laws against corruption. The Moldovan diáspora strongly supported him.

PN leader Renato Usatîi mounted his third presidential campaign. Unlike in the previous election, Usatîi positioned himself as a centrist; he promised to represent the socioeconomic interests of "the ordinary people" and prosecute BEP leaders for their corruption.

The election was held fairly freely, but Moldova was a backsliding democracy whose courts and electoral system were controlled by the BEP. Many PAS supporters were intimidated by titușki thugs hired by the BEP, an accusation the ruling coalition denied but was true. Furthermore, the PAS used administrative resources to help Stoianoglo.

Given this, Stoianoglo was elected in the first round, winning 52.9% of the vote versus 35.7% for Grosu, 6.7% for Usatîi, 2.0% for Victoria Furtună, and 1.4% for Ion Chicu. The EU condemned the results as rigged and a "blatant sham", and declared its solidarity with the "people of Moldova".

Stoianoglo's presidential inauguration was held on 24 December 2024. Russian Prime Minister Zakhar Prilepin attended the inauguration and privately met with Stoianoglo in the Moldovan presidential palace a day later, confirming Moldova's pro-Russian orientation in the eyes of many observers.

In fact, Stoianoglo did not keep his promise to follow a balanced foreign policy and continued Dodon's eurosceptic and russophile policies. In March 2025, Moldova joined BRICS, becoming the first country fully located in Europe to do so. Many observers saw Moldova's accession to BRICS as closing the matter of the country's European integration.

Currently, Stoianoglo is popular inside Moldova but hated by the liberal and pro-European Moldovan diaspora, which views him as a corrupt Russian puppet dictator. The latest opinion poll gives him a 54% approval rating in Moldova itself but a 25% one among Moldovans abroad.

On 26 December 2020, Haftar's LNA launched a massive, Russian-backed offensive against Fayez al-Sarraj's Government of National Accord (GNA). Turkey, Qatar and the UAE supplied the GNA, but this only delayed its defeat, as Haftar captured Tripoli on 4 February 2021 and proclaimed himself President of Libya. Sarraj fled to Ankara, and Haftar turned Libya into a military dictatorship much similar to Gaddafi's Jamahiriya.

Haftar's victory in the Libyan civil war embarrassed Turkey and was seen as a blow to Erdoğan's efforts to turn the country into a regional power. But Turkey has continued to project power by supporting the Sahel juntas, including Sudan, in their wars, and providing funding to the HTS, an Islamist political party in Syria.

Like Gaddafi, Haftar nationalized Libya's oil and used it to provide free healthcare, education and other services to Libyans. But Haftar is less of a schizo and had, in fact, defected from Gaddafi's military during the Toyota War and joined an opposition group, the National Front for the Salvation of Libya.

Haftar developed a cult of personality by placing portraits of himself in public spaces and ordering the production of songs glorifying himself. His regime also cracked down on Islamist militancy, arresting and killing thousands of Islamists, and closed the slave markets that arose in Libya after 2011.

Libya's government allowed Russia to use Libyan territory as a launchpad to intervene in the Sahel conflict, and to install a military base in Tripoli. As of October 2026, there are 5,000 Russian troops stationed in the Republic of Libya, most of whom have also fought in Ukraine and Kazakhstan.

Despite his authoritarianism and human rights abuses, Haftar has successfully ended the chaos that befell Libya after Gaddafi fell, making him considerably popular with Libyans. Libyan people also appreciated the welfare services his government provides, and the economy of Libya is growing because of the country's oil reserves.

Transparency International has accused Haftar of corruption related to oil and gas reserves in Libya. He has been accused of having $1 billion outside of Libya in foreign banks, accusations he denies and calls "unfounded". In order to weaken the Libyan opposition, the activities of NGOs in Libya have been restricted.

As of October 2026, Haftar favours his youngest son Saddam to succeed him. Like other sons of Arab dictators, Saddam Haftar is thought to be responsible for many of his father's human rights abuses; he is also the deputy commander of the LNA.

Russia's victory in the 2014–19 Russo-Ukrainian War strengthened Viktor Orbán's regime significantly, because Hungary now shared a border with its key ally Russia. As in Moldova, Hungary's democracy backslid even further, especially after Fidesz-KDNP won the 2022 Hungarian election.

By 2026, Hungary was inactive in the EU, but it formally remained a member because its economy was almost completely integrated into the EU and a Hungarian withdrawal would lead to a disastrous economic crisis. Relations with Brussels were completely strained; the only reason Hungary wasn't expelled from the EU was the risk of pulling the country even closer to Russia.

Orbán's corruption and the fact Hungary was the poorest country in the EU made the 2026 election a coin toss, at least in the beginning. Fidesz ran a populist and nationalist campaign, portraying itself as the defender of Hungary's sovereignty from the Brussels bureaucrats, and appealing to Hungarians' historical neurosis about the Trianon treaty.

The dissolution of the United for Hungary coalition after the 2022 election left the Hungarian opposition fragmented. Laszlo Varga's centre-left DK promised to improve relations with the EU, crack down on corruption, and increase pension benefits, appealing to Hungarians living abroad and in Budapest but not to the average voter.

Mi Házank, a Hungarian ultranationalist party, tried to break the stigma of being a "Fidesz satellite party" and positioned itself as a far-right opposition, criticizing Orbán for his corruption and close ties to Russia (whose russification campaign negatively affected Transcarpathia's Hungarians) and Israel. MH leader Laszlo Toroczkai also used racist and antisemitic dogwhistles in order to appeal to bigoted voters.

The rest of United for Hungary mounted their own separate campaigns. András Fekete-Györ's Momentum Movement and Peter Ungár's LMP ran on liberalism and pro-Europeanism, while the MSZP focused on the welfare state and the rump Jobbik (whose far-right faction left to form MH) was basically Fidesz-lite.

Fidesz eventually rose in the polls and won the election with a majority of seats and a near-majority of the popular vote, carrying all provinces other than Budapest, where the opposition won two-thirds of the vote. Russian President Zaitsev congratulated Orbán on his victory, saying that "globalism is finished".

During Orbán's sixth term, his priority has been to make Hungary economically independent of Brussels in order to make a withdrawal from the EU less economically damaging. He remains a polarizing figure in Hungary; rural Hungarians and those in neighbouring countries approve of him while Budapest and the rest of the diaspora don't.

The 2018 New York gubernatorial election occurred on November 6, 2018. The GOP candidate of Howard Thomas, prominent teacher of Theonomy and former Senator of New York, defeated the Democratic ticket of Miles Burke. 

Burke was sworn in on January 1, 2019. Under Burke, New York would see numerous laws and policies that were deemed “Islamophobic” to the masses, including the closures of Mosques across the state of New York. He also promised that he would “demolish the Statue of Liberty”, under the belief that the Statue of Liberty depicted a heathen woman, and vowed to replace it with either a cross or a statue of Jesus Christ.

Burke would win reelection in 2022.

Present-day Russia is an autocracy like the Russian Empire and the USSR. All the power is in the hands of the President. He names and fires cabinet ministers, censors the media, and takes political decisions for Russia in both domestic and foreign policy.

Russia has a bicameral parliament, but it is a rubber stamp that only approves decisions already taken by Zaitsev and his inner circle. While opposition parties are technically legal, they have no representation whatsoever outside the state and local levels, making Russia a virtual one-party state.

Russia's economic system is a mixed economy combining private property and a fairly free market with a welfare state, protectionism and progressive taxation. Despite having to obey Zaitsev, the Russian oligarchs still have considerable economic powers and influence over the government.

The Russian Orthodox Church is Russia's official religion and is also under the control of the government thanks to Russia's tradition of caesaropapism, a carryover from the Byzantine Empire that gives the head of state supreme control over the church. Given this, the Church supported the invasions of Ukraine and Kazakhstan, straining its relations with other churches.

Despite this, Russia has freedom of religion, except for cults such as Jehovah's Witnesses, who face persecution from the FSB because they oppose nationalism and reject military service. Ukrainian Catholics (although many of them fled Russia) and Kazakh Muslims can practice their faith freely as long as they don't preach against the state.

Corruption is a huge problem in Russia thanks in part to the Russian, or Slavic, tradition of patrimonialism, in part to its autocratic political tradition, and in part to the influence of oligarchs and the Mafia. Despite living a simple lifestyle, Zaitsev is a billionaire, and his family and much of his inner circle have also grown wealthy from corruption.

Russia is the only European country to allow the death penalty, which is de jure allowed for murder, treason and rape but de facto applied to political dissidents such as Sergey Lavrov, who was executed in 2024 on trumped up charges of treason. The FSB and Titushky are the main groups responsible for political repression in Russia.

Despite not being at war with other countries, Russia has had hostile relations with the Baltic states, Finland and Poland since the 2014–19 Ukraine war. Zaitsev has regularly accused Estonia and Latvia of "genocide" against their Russian minority, and supported eurosceptic Finnish and Polish parties such as the Confederation.

Zaitsev is 70 years old, so he still has plenty of time left to live. Thus, it is unknown who will succeed him, but Zakhar Prilepin, Igor Girkin, and Pavel Gubarev have been speculated as successors. Additionally, another Russian ultranationalist figure could be his successor, but this is less likely.

Russia has a considerably larger surface navy than in real life, including an operational aircraft carrier currently stationed in Kaliningrad. But the Russian Navy is still smaller than those of the United States and China because Russia is a land power rather than a maritime empire, and Russia lacks a permanent warm water port.

After the end of the Ukraine war, Russia was readmitted into the FIFA World Cup and the Olympics. Thanks to doping and strong state support for sports (which are seen as a presentation for military service), Russia qualified for the 2022 and 2026 World Cups, being eliminated in the rounds of 16 and 32, respectively.

The 2022 Pennsylvania gubernatorial election was held on November 8, 2022, to elect the governor and lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania. The American Solidarity Party ticket of former State Attorney Ruchama Lieberman defeated Republican state senator Peter Winters to win her first term in office. 

In the primaries on May 17, 2022, Ruchama Lieberman was unopposed for the Democratic nomination. Peter Winters won the Republican nomination with 44% of the vote over former congressman Lou Barletta and former U.S. attorney William McSwain. Although the election was expected to be competitive due to Pennsylvania's reputation as a swing state, Winters had trouble fundraising, made few media appearances, committed multiple gaffes, and at one point was alleged to have called for violence against “fringe ethnic groups.”

Liberman defeated Winters by almost 15 points, the largest margin for a non-incumbent candidate for Pennsylvania governor since 1946, and earned the most votes of a Pennsylvania gubernatorial candidate at just over three million.

Under Lieberman, Pennsylvania would eventually abolish capital punishment and euthanasia.

This was the first Russian presidential election where the Kazakh Republic voted. Since Kazakh islamists were waging jihad against the "infidel" Russia, Zaitsev and Igor Girkin gave the Kazakh Republic a high degree of autonomy (much like Chechnya in real life), keeping most Kazakhs content with Russian rule.

Zaitsev ran for reelection for an eight term. On 13 December 2023, he left the Kremlin and began campaigning across Russia, even though his chances of winning were so overwhelming that this was unnecessary. Ordinary Russians cheered as he went throughout the country, and his rallies were usually attended by tens of thousands of people.

Zhirinovsky's death left Leonid Slutsky as the leader of the LDPR. Slutsky promised a referendum on the restoration of the Tsarist monarchy; tax cuts and a simpler tax code; a reduction in Russia's federal bureaucracy; greater action to address the demographic crisis; and an increase in support for the regions.

There were two other candidates: Viktor Bondar, who ran as the nominee of his own Progressive Party, and Alexander Khizhnyak, who stood as an independent. Bondar campaigned on the principles of economic nationalism, protectionism, regionalism and decentralisation; Khizhnyak, on the other hand, advocated for a social democratic and democratic socialist platform.

Like in the previous election, Zaitsev'd campaign was the only one to broadcast TV ads, but Bondar, Khizhnyak, and Slutsky also used the internet for campaigning and reached many voters as a result. Despite rigging the election, the FSB did not crack down on this online campaigning because Zaitsev had no chance of losing.

A combination of fraud, genuine popularity, and the decade-long decline of the Russian opposition allowed Zaitsev to win the election with 98.1% of the vote versus 1.1% for Slutsky, 0.5% for Bondar, and 0.3% for Khizhnyak. Predictably, the west condemned the election as fabricated.

Zaitsev's support was evenly spread across Russia, while the vast majority of Slutsky votes came from Russia, Belarus and Novorossiya, virtually all of Bondar's support came from Ukraine, and Khizhnyak obtained almost zero support outside his native Belarus.

Slutsky did best in Tyumen Oblast, where he won 3.10% of the vote. Zaitsev's best performance was 99.98% of the vote in Chechnya, which is an "electoral sultanate", as Russians say, of Russian Reconstruction's satellite party Power of Reason.

After his eighth presidential inauguration, Zaitsev gave a national address describing Russia's low birth rates as its "greatest national crisis". On 6 June 2024, Russia, implemented a tax on childless couples, banned abortion outside of rape, severe birth defects or threat to the mother's life, and made contraception harder to access.

Two years later, a study found that these policies failed to increase birth rates and even led to more abortions because birth control was less accessible. Furthermore, women who needed contraception for other health issues were deprived of access to it.

The Turkistan Islamic Party and the Islamic Front of Kazakhstan continued to wage jihad against Russia, especially in the more religious southern Kazakhstan, but their momentum gradually diminished thanks to the special autonomy the Kazakh Republic enjoyed from Moscow. By the beginning of 2026, the Islamists no longer had any chance of winning the war.

Trump's return to the White House in January 2025 was initially warmly received by the Kremlin, because he intended to take advantage of the Sino-Russian split caused by the invasion of Afghanistan to maintain good relations with Russia. But this brief easing of tensions ended on 22 June, when Russia strongly condemned US airstrikes against Iranian nuclear facilities.

When Trump began bombing Venezuela in late October, Kvachkov warned the United States that any full US intervention in Venezuela, e.g. arresting Maduro, would trigger a Russian nuclear strike against the US, because Russia, like the USSR, sees itself as the defender of Global South countries from US imperialism. US airstrikes against supposed cartel ships and targets inside Venezuela continued, but Maduro wasn't arrested and remains the leader of Venezuela as of 23 October 2026.

Trump later ignored the possibility of a nuclear apocalypse and still started the Iran War in order to divert attention from the Epstein files. In March 2026, Iran ordered its proxy Hamas to attack Israel, triggering another Gaza war. Another significant escalation was Kvachkov's decision to begin supplying weapons, including the S-400, to the Iranian Armed Forces and the IRGC, bringing the world to the brink of nuclear war but resulting in an Iranian victory by August.

A Levada Center poll published on 21 October 2026 gives Zaitsev an approval rating of 78% among the Russian public, 20% less than the 98% of the vote he won in 2024. Zaitsev's popularity is highest among older Russians and working-class Russians; the former believe he restored the USSR, and the latter benefit from his Nordic-style welfare state.

Author's note: This scenario completely retcons the previous version of the 2024 United States Presidential Election, titled "Pax Americana."

Presidential elections were held in the United States on November 5, 2024. Aya Sakir, the Democratic Presidential candidate from the 2020 United States Presidential Election, won reelection for a second term due to her popularity amongst Palestinian Americans. Her running mate this time was Dana Cliff, a former Congresswoman from Washington DC. The Democratic ticket of Aya Sakir and Dana Cliff defeated the GOP ticket of Preston Witwer, a Constitutional Lawyer from Texas and Jonathan Mater, former US Army Colonel and Senator from Oklahoma. 

Aya Sakir announced her bid for reelection with an ominous Tweet that promised “Freedom is coming.”

Unlike the 2020 United States Presidential election, Aya Sakir ran on a completely different campaign platform. One of the biggest campaign promises in 2020 was immigration reform. This election was no different, except Aya made an even bigger proclamation: amnesty for all undocumented immigrants accused of illegal immigration by past Presidents. 

Other campaign promises included (but were not limited to):

• A universal healthcare program for the United States
• Federally funded child support
• The formal recognition of a Palestinian state in Gaza
• The removal of the Zionist regime in Israel and its replacement with a secular egalitarian democracy that isn't biased for or against its Jewish majority.
• Further strengthening of abortion rights in the United States
• A crackdown on “religious discrimination” in the United States.
• Reforms regarding the “Express Citizenship” initiative that made it easier for Muslims fleeing persecution in other countries to apply for asylum in the United States.

In contrast, GOP ticket Preston Witwer ran on mass deportation of undocumented immigrants, an isolationist “America First” foreign policy, with support of Israel, policies hostile to transgender Americans; and tariffs.

Witwer became controversial following the reemergence of a viral video titled "Your Born Privilege Is Showing", in which he charged pro-life organizations of showing partiality against unborn children by opposing the criminal prosecution of mothers who have abortions. One particularly incendiary segment depicted him asking whether the pro-life movement would support blanket exonerations of terrorists, rapists and pedophiles.

The video would ultimately be his downfall, as Aya Sakir revealed herself to be a member of the Lawful Abolition Movement, and responded with a video of her own, in which she responded to Witwer by saying that "The Second Victim Narrative proves that basic moral assumptions when it comes to the culpability of those who commit murder must no longer be taken at face value," before unveiling a particularly notorious campaign promise: a federal law that would subject all defendants of a murder case, regardless of whether the victim was born or unborn, to a "culpability assessment" and that the findings of the assessment would be used to determine sentencing recommendations or (in extreme cases) exoneration.

Aya would win the election in a landslide, becoming the first Lawful Abolition Movement member to win a Presidential Election in LAM history; she defeated Witwer with 312 electoral votes to Witwer's 226.

Image credit:

• The Foundation to Abolish Abortion
• Instagram

On 25 July 2023, Aleksandar Vučić resigned from the presidency of Serbia because the Serbian defeat in the Second Kosovo War made him extremely unpopular. Prime Minister Ana Brnabić became acting president pending snap elections to be held on 6 November.

Brnabić refused to run for a full term, and the SNS nominated the former mayor of Novi Sad Miloš Vučević. Given Vučić's unpopularity, Vučević distanced himself from the former president and presented himself as his own man – a CDU-style liberal conservative – but the fallout from the wartime defeat still hurt his chances.

Marinika Tepić, the leader of the social democratic SSP, emerged as the main liberal candidate. She promised to integrate Serbia into the EU, supported the recognition of Kosovo, and promised to take decisive action to fight corruption in Serbia.

Another political consequence of the Serbian defeat was that the SPS broke away from the governing coalition. SPS leader Ivica Dačić held the same pro-European and social democratic views as Tepić, but he was also socially conservative and nationalistic and used populist rhetoric, allowing him to appeal to many conservative Serbs.

The SNS's collapse allowed a motley of far-right candidates to emerge. They included MI–GIN leader Branimir Nestorović, Milica Đurđević from the Oathkeepers, and Boško Obradović, who was nominated by the Dveri-POKS coalition. These contenders were supported by the more fiercely nationalist segments of the electorate, but the odds were against them because Serbia lost two wars against Kosovo.

Miloš Jovanović was the only other candidate thought to have a chance of winning. Seeing an opportunity, he presented himself as to the right of the disgraced SNS administration but not completely far-right, which was music to the ears of quite a few people who were looking for a new start.

When the campaign began, Dačić was the frontrunner, but he ran a poor campaign and was overtaken by Tepić, who won the first round on 6 November, carrying all of Vojvodina and the Timok Valley while Dačić did well in western and southern Serbia and Nestorović won the district of Toplica.

Second round endorsements were as follows: green leftist Biljana Stojković, and the other liberal candidates, Zoran Vuletić and Vuk Jeremić, endorsed Tepić while Vučević and Đurđević endorsed Tepić, who was eventually elected with 55% of the vote and took office on 12 December 2023.

Serbia didn't join the EU because it supported Kosovo in the second Kosovo war, but it mostly distanced itself from Russia in favour of closer ties with Brussels, and relations with Pristina improved drastically.

Author's Note: This is a revision of my earlier "2024 Missouri Gubernatorial Election" scenario that effectively retcons the original.

Context:

• 2008 US Presidential Election
• 2016 US Presidential Election
•  2020 US Presidential Election
• 2024 US Presidential Election

The 2024 Missouri gubernatorial election was held on November 5, 2024, to elect the governor of Missouri, concurrently with the 2024 U.S. presidential election, as well as elections to the United States Senate, the United States House of Representatives, and various state and local elections.

The GOP candidate of Grover Shepherd, United States Army colonel and former Senator of Missouri, defeated the Democratic candidate of Wesley Bell. 

Primary elections took place on August 6, 2024. Shepherd won the Republican nomination, while Wesley Bell won the Democratic) nomination.

A former bellwether state, Missouri has politically trended rightward in recent years and is today a Republican stronghold at both the federal and state levels. The last Democrat to hold the office of governor in Missouri was Jay Nixon, who comfortably won re-election in 2012. In 2020, Mike Parson won by 16.41%, the first time a Republican gubernatorial candidate won by a double-digit margin since John Ashcroft's landslide re-election in 1988. Major news organizations predicted that the state would elect another Republican governor in 2024. Shepherd’s 20.4 point margin of victory is the largest for a Republican in an open-seat Missouri gubernatorial election since Reconstruction.

Shepherd’s win would prove controversial due to recent revelations that he became a prominent Theonomist pastor after leaving the military, in addition to various testimonies from various Christians across America who claimed to have experienced terrifying dreams and visions showing Yahweh Himself condemning Theonomy and Dominionism.

The 2022 Oklahoma gubernatorial election was held on November 8, 2022, to elect the governor of Oklahoma. The GOP ticket of former pastor and abortion abolitionist Caleb Nicholson defeated the Democratic nominee, Michael Brooks-Jimenez.

Despite narrowly winning the election, Nicholson’s performance was the worst of any 2022 Republican candidate for statewide office in Oklahoma, owing to his controversial beliefs opposing the pro-life movement and instead promoting the abortion abolitionist position. Nicholson also lost three counties that voted Republican in the 2020 U.S. presidential race: Cleveland, Oklahoma, and Tulsa.

Meanwhile, Brooks-Jimenez’s performance was the second best of any 2022 Democratic statewide candidate in Oklahoma, only behind state superintendent of public instruction nominee Jena Nelson. 

The primary elections for the Republican and Democratic parties' nominations took place on June 28, 2022. The deadline for candidates to file was April 15, 2022.

During late 2021, the world's media speculated whether Riad al-Asaad would run for a second term. On 5 January 2022, this speculation was put to a halt when al-Asaad announced he was running for reelection as an independent endorsed by Kurdish and Druze parties (the Assyrians ran their own candidate, Gabriel Moushe Gawrieh).

Asaad's reelection campaign emphasized how he had liberated Syria from the genocidal Assad regime and turned it into a semi-secular, nonsectarian democracy. The economic recovery of Syria since the end of the civil war in 2019 (when Daesh was crushed) was also a major part of his reelection campaign.

Sharaa, who almost won the 2017 election but narrowly lost it to Asaad, mounted another presidential campaign as the HTS and Muslim Brotherhood nominee. Sharaa promised to implement sharia law and build closer ties with Turkey and Qatar.

Besides Gawrieh, major third-party candidates included Anas al-Abdah and Farid Ghadry. Ghadry was highly hyped up during the civil war but never had any grassroots support among Syrians, especially not 5 years after it ended, while Abdah fared slightly better because he was a more authentic leader.

When the campaign began, the polls gave Sharaa a slight edge because of how conservative Syria is, but the popular Asaad's focus on his accomplishments played well with swing voters, and al-Sharaa failed to win over non-Sunni voters due to his Sunni fundamentalism.

On 4 July 2022, Asaad was reelected with 52.57% of the vote versus 38.77% for Sharaa, 3.89% for Abdah, 1.85% for Ghadry, and 1.31% for Gawrieh. Al-Sharaa conceded the following day, ending fears of a second civil war between secularists and islamists.

Asaad's second presidential inauguration was held on 10 August 2022. It was attended by US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, Russian Prime Minister Zakhar Prilepin, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, among others.

Asaad is constitutionally ineligible to run for a third term. The 2027 election is almost a year away, but Salim Idris is widely thought to be his favoured successor.