2019 Libirachi Coup d'état

Location

The **2019 Libirachi Coup d'état**, also known as the **September 24 Coup**, took place between September 24 and September 25, 2019 and saw a faction of government and the Libirachi Imperial Army overthrow the democratically elected President Nathan Jackson and install a temporary Imperial State Council with former Education Minister Laura Fox being appointed as the new president before stepping down on November 11, 2019 to ascend to the formerly dormant Libirachi throne as the first Emperor of the Libirachi Empire following the dissolution of the monarchy in 1852.

During the coup d'état, President Nathan Jackson was violently executed and much of his government defected to the new regime; Jackson's cabinet would remain in office under successive presidents until 2023. Ironically for a coup designed to uphold the power of the armed forces, the new regime installed by the Imperial State Council would ultimately dismantle and curtail the extensive role of the army within a decade and a half of coming to power. However, in the place of the armed forces the Commission for the Preservation of the New Order was formed to protect and secure the new regime, encompassing security, intelligence and paramilitary organisations into it's remit - by 2033, the Commission (COMPNOR) would become the most powerful single organisation in the nation.

As one of the key moments in Libirachi history, the 2019 coup d'état signalled the end of the ongoing democratisation efforts being undertaken by President Nathan Jackson, as well as the end of the republican movement within the nation. Under the leadership of a new military junta, the Imperial Republic of Libirachi was given a death-blow following the Imperial State Council's closure of the Libirachi National Congress after the coup, whilst the Assent Bill (2019) passed in November 2019 heralded the return of the imperial throne under the leadership of Laura Fox. Under Fox's reign, co-conspirator Xi Jimping was appointed as president, whilst other military figures involved were quickly removed from office, leaving the empress as the sole central political power within the new Fox Dynasty.

## Coup

 **President of the Libirachi Empire****Presidency • Cabinet** 2010 Libirachi Presidential Election • Planned 2015 Libirachi Presidential Election • Libirachi Democratic Transitional Council • Imperial Security Bureau • Libirachi Revolutionary Party • Hǔnluàn • Quokka • Mandate to the People Act of 2010 • Patriot Act (2019) • Route To Freedom Act of 2019 • Second Thaw • Invasion of Iran • **2019 Libirachi Coup d'état**

As part of a growing frustration with the Imperial Army's refusal to bow down to the whims of the his government, President Nathan Jackson introduced the Patriot Act of 2019 into the Libirachi National Congress in July 2019 after being displeased with the incompetence of senior officers within the Libirachi Army during the botched Invasion of Iran in May 2019. Whilst having to deal with the loss of some of his most loyal officers, Jackson attempted to push his new Patriotism Act based on the original bill from Xi Kanna's presidency, but with the rights of military personnel severely downplayed and the role of High Command delegated to the President's inner circle, all the while reducing the importance of commissioned military officers in favour of a new army of shocktroopers loyal only to the President. Enraged by the disregard for the Imperial High Command, Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces Kanan Garel began putting together a coalition of forces in government to depose the Libirachi President, enlisting the help of Education Secretary Laura Fox and the LIA liaison to the Ministry of Defence, Xi Jimping, to front the new civilian government which was to be placed as a puppet regime for the armed forces. Launching from the military barracks on September 23, 2019, the Imperial Army rolled out its armed forces into key cities across the empire, except from Beijing which was controlled by members of Imperial Intelligence and the ever loyal Imperial Security Bureau. Quickly seizing control of the extensive infrastructure project maintained by the First Legion, the army blocked off all contact to the Forbidden City from all parts of the empire, leaving the President isolated and confused as to what was transpiring - unbeknownst to him, the LIA had managed to occupy vast swathes of civilian governed areas, and further controlling military districts. As the government hurriedly attempted to re-gain control of districts over the night of September 23 and the day of September 24, the military kept up its relentless domination of provinces, causing many to fall in a domino effect to the army forces before the new Imperial State Council which had proclaimed its governance on September 24, 2019.

 **Empress of the Libirachi Empire****Reign** • **Coronation**Xi Jimping I, WarHǔnluàn • COMPNOR • Libirachi Imperial Army • Fox Dynasty • Hunt for the Hǔnluàn • Explosion at the Xi Kanna Power Plant • Explosion at the Ulaanbaatar Government Building • Has Wars • Bovido Invasion of the Libirachi Empire • Death

 **President of the Libirachi Empire****Presidency****2019 Libirachi Coup d'état** • Assent Bill (2019) • Imperial State Council • Imperial High Command

Surrounding the city of Beijing over the night of September 24, the State Council forces made their way though the city under the cover of darkness, infiltrating the barracks of ISB soldiers before using a series of underground tunnels to make their way into key districts of the city. With the breaking of dawn the next day, the army forced its way through the barricade at the entrances to the capital of Beijing, mobilising troops to seize government buildings and apprehend anyone who tried to repel them. District after district fell to the sheer military might, each one proclaiming loyalty to their new leaders whilst ISB agents fled back to the city centre. The tanks rolled out on every high street, the platoon marched through every town. The country came to a deadlock as streets were blocked by armed guards, and houses were searched for fugitives. Within hours, the last remaining threat to the new regime had fallen, and only central Beijing remained as part of Jackson's forces.

Within the hour, the Army congregated on Beijing, armed with fighter tanks and legions of soldiers. Bursting in through the city gates, the LIA fought their way through streets of Imperial Guards, the Beijing defence force, which were determined not to let them through. After an intense firefight, the LIA managed to roll through, devastating the surrounding areas. By 6pm, the Army had cut through to the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square, where the Imperial Government was based. Much to the horror of the State Council, they were greeted with a deployment of Imperial Guards, and a large contingent of Presidential Guards - the President's personal security force. The ensuring battle lasted a solid hour, by which point night was beginning to set in over the skies of Beijing. With the much of the Imperial Guard dead, a convoy of military registered 4x4s and escort limos arrived outside the Libirachi National Congress headquarters and Presidential offices in the Hall of Revolution, with the limo containing then Environment Secretary dame Laura Fox. Entering the building flanked by a contingent of loyal soldiers, Fox and her cohorts made their way through the building, storming through various ceremonial halls and stairways in continued bouts of firefights against ISB operatives and the Presidential Guard. Marching though the building, the LIA met even more resistance from a further deployment of Presidential Guards, in a firefight that shredded the National Congress room. With much of the guard distracted in the Congress room, Fox and her escort made their way through the building towards the Presidential Suite, killing those in the way and spraying the offices of Jackson loyalist office staff with bullets and leaving the majority dead. Arriving at the presidential suite, Fox's escort smashed into the offices and capturing senior officials within Jackson's office like the UN ambassador Chen Zhili who was dragged out of her offices and shot in the hallway outside the presidential suite. Smashing their way into the Round Room of the Hall of Revolution, the president's private office, the escort shot down the presidential guard, allowing Fox to march in and face down the startled Jackson, who supposedly said "et tu Brute?" in reference to the betrayal of Fox in an allude to the Roman dictator Julius Caesar who was betrayed by his own inner circle. Undeterred by Jackson's remark, Fox shot Jackson where he sat - twice in the chest, and once in the head - killing him instantly.

## Aftermath

### Hǔnluàn

 Main article: Hǔnluàn

Having stormed through the nation between September 23 and September 25, 2019, the Libirachi coup had managed to topple most of the resistance to the armed forces, sending many of them into exile in the western reaches of the nation led nominally by Wang Yi, the former president's personal secretary and the person closest to the deposed leader. Fleeing to the outreaches of the empire with a coalition of various different political allies , Wang proclaimed himself as the self proclaimed President of a new Libirachi Republic. Encountering former Marshal of the LIA Ashton Morre and his band of cohorts in the western mountains, Wang and Morre formed a working partnership, merging the two entities with Morre's gabble becoming the armed wing of the republic. Persuaded by Morre to rebrand the organisation into a paramilitary style regime as so to actually control the territory in which it occupied, Wang re-christened the group as the Hǔnluàn, with Morre's forces conducting various terror attacks against the new Fox Regime in the Libirachi Empire.

Over the winter months of 2019, the Hǔnluàn began conducting major attacks on the Libirachi Empire under the leadership of Morre who deposed Supreme Marshal Wang Yi on December 19, 2019 and installed himself as the leader, but their campaign of chaos came to an end in January 2020 when the Libirachi Imperial Army conducted a joint raid on their mountain headquarters in eastern China, tipped off by a former member of the insurgent group, and shut down most of the Hǔnluàn network in the eastern reaches of the Empire. However, Ashton Morre and his cabal of loyal supporters mostly escaped and began causing local uprisings in neighbouring areas, such as Bovido Has and the expanding Persian Republic (which had gained self rule from Bovido Has in 2018). Following this, the Hǔnluàn became increasingly ambitious in their assault on Bovido Has, and engineered a political crisis in which both the Libirachi ambassador to Makassar and the Bovido Hassian Archbishop and Emperor were killed, with both parties blaming each other, beginning the Has wars. Despite no outwardly proven evidence for this case being presented, a common theory of historians and social-political commentators is that the Director General of COMPNOR, Penny Fox, provided funding and equipment to the Hǔnluàn in order to use the entity to target groups and governments hostile to the empire whilst staging attacks on it's own soil to disguise this; furthermore, it seems highly likely that if this activity was happening, it was unsanctioned and largely unknown to all but a select handful of COMPNOR officials, meaning that even Imperial High Command and the Empress Fox were in the dark about the involvement.

With the two superpowers of Bovido Has and the Libirachi Empire spiralling down into war, the Hǔnluàn switched it's target towards the fledging Persian Republic under the leadership of Emanuel Parra, destabilising the nation to the point where Parra and his government abdicated their responsibilities for their safety and fled to the Libirachi Empire. Meanwhile, Morre seized power and began forcing a state of anarchy into the nation, essentially making Persia into a terrorist's paradise with no laws and no centralised government with much of the Persian Congress in hiding alongside the exiled government. Eventually with the attention of the Libirachi beginning to turn away from Bovido Has, the Libirachi Imperial Army launched an attack on Persia, seemingly killing Morre in a bombing raid on his convoy as they evacuated him from the Nupersia Congress building. Recalling the Hǔnluàn loyalists back to a session of congress, Karen Sanders was officially appointed as the President of Persia, and quickly began to call upon the LIA to cease its campaign under the premise that she was a democratic proponent of democracy but her regime came crumbling down as the congress in exile held an election to select it's new leader, picking exiled Libirachi politician Almac Docu to hold office of president, which he took the role of on September 1, 2021 with the execution of Sanders at the hands of the Libirachi Imperial Army. Having lost a second leader in the space of a week and having lost control over the Persian Republic at the same time, a battered Hǔnluàn under the leadership of Anton Ivanov continued in its attempts to keep a foothold in Persia, which ultimately came unravelled with interference from Almac Docu's government.

### Life anew

All that remained of Jackson's support base surrendered the next day, officially supporting the new regime. Propaganda was issued to the people to re-assure them that the military might they had seen was just a exercise drill, albeit a large one, and that the government was as stable as ever. Only those in the Forbidden City knew of Jackson's death, and it was the new government's intention to keep it that way. The leaders of the coup (Laura Fox, Xi Jimping, Damian Hurst, Cassio Tagge and Bowen Shi) began to plan how the new government would be declared, and the LIA generals were keen to have a singular plan of action for the Declaration of the New Order. The leadership campaign that followed saw Fox as the most popular with the military, and as such, she was declared the President of the Libirachi Empire on the 27th of September 2019

## International Reception

Many international leaders, even critics of the Jackson regime, denounced the coup feverishly in an attempt to try and keep favour with the dictator as initial reports showed the army coup would fall apart within hours, thus prompting leaders such as UK Prime Minister David Cameron to denounce the takeover, an act which eventually lead to Libirachi influence toppling the Cameron ministry in 2021 as revenge.