Comintern Volunteers

**Dev. Status** | Concepted

The **Comintern Volunteers** are soldiers made of volunteering communists of all nations, whether or not their governments are Soviet aligned, looking for a new life, service to the global revolution, and World Socialist Alliance wide citizenship upon the completion of their service. Taking from the best, regardless of background, and making them better, they are regarded as the true counterparts of the Allied Peacekeepers, though they are very specifically an elite task force chosen only from those who want to be there, show the skills needed to even qualify, and pass incredibly strict psychological certification exams that ensure only the most honourable people can join.

After all, they are supposed to be propaganda poster boys, and anything less than the most earnest and noble Young Pioneer (or Boy Scout to use an analogy more familiar to Americans) simply won't do. This means that they are a small force outnumbered about three to one by the peacekeepers, but it means they bear a great deal of respect even from anti-communists. They answer not to any nation, not even the Soviet Union itself, but only to the Communist International, and now with Davidova trying to re-emphasise internationalism, the organisation that had once been largely relegated to a scalpel force by Cherdenko who emphasised the national armies instead has seen a steady increase in recruitment.

Regarded as a contender for the best soldiers in the world, they are an enduring symbol of the commitment to internationalism, revolution, and the classless future where man is free of its brutish prehistory to live its true, authentic history free of the bonds of exploitation and alienation.

## Background

### The Revolution Marches On

The Revolutionary Volunteer Army of the Communist International was formed at the suggestion of Alexandra Kollontai and Amadeo Bordiga as Stalin started to shift from his prior positions of socialism in one country and avoiding confrontation with the capitalist world when the news of the USSR surpassing even the USA in terms of gross domestic product and industrial output was met with alarm and fearmongering now that the Union had become the world's most powerful country. A former member of the worker's opposition of the most radical communists and the sitting chairman of the Italian Internationalist Communist Party respectively, they believed this gesture would be an authentic manoeuvre towards a true internationalism now that Stalin was starting to move around to world revolutionary rhetoric.

Though he had initially been reluctant to move forward with it, when the Stahlpakt-Soviet War had escalated into a generalised international conflict, Stalin recognised that what had once been a simple conflict with Schleicher and Ciano's governments had grown into a world war that the Soviet Union was short on allies for, and so without other options he made the call for global revolution against bourgeois society and announced the formation of an international volunteer army that would be beyond any one nation in the common cause of human brotherhood. With Soviet support of the second German and Italian revolutions as well as the Chinese and Korean uprisings as Soviet troops overwhelmed the initial military forces arrayed against them, Konstantin Rokossovsky and Vasilievsky would oversee the formation of a new, internationalist task force with the aid of figures such as Lin Biao, Ludwig Renn, Tito, and Luigi Longo to aid in what they proclaimed was the beginning of the end for bourgeois class rule across the world.

These soldiers would not bear any national symbology and be beholden only to a new, independent command subordinated only to the Communist International itself; beyond even the Soviet Union's authority; that would be first chaired by Peng Denghuai, a masterful strategist and tactician who had often triumphed against seemingly insurmoutable odds and would be equipped with the best equipment that Socialist science could produce, though with an emphasis on breakthrough capability over the sheer mass and weight of the Black Guard. Whereas the Black Guard would carry itself in infamy and brutality, the Volunteers were regarded as a worthy, chivalrous opponent even by their worst enemies, always looking for converts rather than corpses and frequently acting to restrain other forces in their behaviour. While the Second World War was not a pretty war on either side with the intensely politicised nature of the conflict and the desires to liquidate class rule or those seen as fifth columns depending on the side, the Volunteers carried themselves with as much honour as the peacekeepers.

When it was clear that Germany and Italy were lost due to the Socialist Overstretch on other fronts, the Volunteers helped to evacuate as many of the communists of these countries as possible, and stopped cold the allied attempts to press into Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, and Romania in defence of Tito's revolution and would make a name for themselves in the great debacle of operation Blackbeard that ultimately ensured the war would end in an amicable stalemate as it was recognised that further fighting was pointless.

### Meet the New comrade

Following the transfer of power from General Secretary Stalin following his untimely death by betrayal to Premier Cherdenko of the Sovnarkom, the Soviet Union's technology advanced remarkably rapidly with the aid of "Zelinsky's cadre", including enormous leaps in production and computer technology as well as many fields of physics even if many complained about Cherdenko's odd decision to purge Psi-Corps as far as he could with the powers of his office save for what GRU Division P and NKGB Division A could protect under their authority, as part of his Leninist restoration and the dismantling of the bulk of the authority of the Politburo. The Volunteers however would continue to sharpen their skills in many proxy conflicts with the Allies, serving whatever revolution needed their aid in advancing or defending it and deploying with the best gear and the best men and women, often from the very countries of the Allies themselves as many who feared retaliation from the Allies for their communist sympathies fled to the Soviet bloc to start a new life.

The Volunteers would be reorganised somewhat, emphasising a doctrine based around acting at the decisive point of battle to either break an enemy line to allow for exploitation by co-belligerents or to cut off and destroy the crux of an enemy advance to allow for a counter-offensive to take advantage of the reduction in enemy strength. Maskirovka, the subtle Soviet art of deception and misleading an enemy into believing one thing when they are actually planning another was also heavily emphasised to allow for the hammer to fall precisely where it was needed.

### Let's Go!

One of the most famous operations of the Volunteers was the invasion of Japan, making use of the Soviet bloc's orbital supremacy over both the Allies and Axis in the war, the Volunteers were dropped en masse into the Japanese home islands to support the groundwork laid by the Japanese Communist Party to prepare the way for a great revolution that was meant to take place after Yoshiro's death. From their specialist access to the Soviet Space Fleet's lift capabilities surpassed only by the Cosmonaut corps, they would enter by aerial insertion, subterranean assault, space launched drop pod, stealthed transport, and more, disgorging more than three hundred thousand volunteers right in the very heart of Japan itself over the course of a month, a massive chunk of the world's Volunteer troops. The Volunteers would tear the guts out of the Imperial Japanese Army, breaking whole divisions at a time and destroying one base after the next.

Hokkaido had fallen, and the troops that had landed in Honshu earlier in the unapproved retaliatory raid were now being reinforced by some of the best of the best such as VDV and the Naval Ground Forces as well as the People Liberation Army and the DPRK's Crownbreaker Task Force to name a few. With relentless force, they were quickly marching down to Tokyo to sweep through Japan's primary megalopolis, and only the Allied invasion of Tokyo via a surprise direct assault and chronosphere mass drop prevented the joint armies of the Communist International from reaching it first. Skirmishing between the Volunteers and Peacekeepers in Kanto had already erupted as Volunteer Commander Abba Kovner was determined to tear the very heart of the Axis out.

Between the works of Generals "Cyclone" Orlov, "Avenger" Kovner, and "Railgun" Misaka the Volunteers had already broken through many of the lines of the Allies and the Imperial Armies, but the hurried and frantic peace settlements to end the war with Japan would to the shock of the Volunteers see them have to leave Japan as Cherdenko was gambling on a major push back into Europe and Africa and wanted the Far East closed as soon as possible. Particularly with word of Jade August filtering into his office. A proposition that Lev Sedov in his position as Chairman of the Presiding Committee of the Communist International agreed on.

### A Red Dawn

In the aftermath of world war three, the Comintern Volunteers have once again solidified their reputation as some of the very best soldiers in the entire world, spearheading the sweep through Northern Honshu and Hokkaido while driving the Allies out of Saxony in the great back-hand blow counter-offensive after the crushing Allied defeat at Berlin where the Volunteers defeated many divisions of the Reservists with a favourable ratio in equipment and manpower lost. Many of the Volunteers in fact, were poised for the great Red Resurrection Offensive analysts speculate about the possible outcome of endlessly. However, some are dissatisfied with Davidova despite her embracing of internationalist Left Communism, pushing the bounds of radicalism even farther past Cherdenko's Leninist restoration. They feel that the decision to accept peace talks is a betrayal of the comrades they left behind in Japan, Western Europe, and the Middle East and the revolutions in the home countries they fought so hard for, and the inability to return to the homes they battled in the name of the revolutions of has left a sour taste in many's mouths.

The commitment of the Volunteers to conflicts such as Vietnam or the global anti-GLA war or to shore up allies such as the Warsaw Pact, Cyberbolivaran Forum, or the PLA, and to support revolutions like can be found in Peru or the Syndicate occupied western Balkans means that the Volunteers continue to keep quite busy, always ready to fight for a revolution, for the time being the politically confused nature of the Continental Revolution keeps them out of America for the most part, but should things change one could expect them to deploy there as well. In the Jungles of Vietnam they are feared as the Red Death, annihilating entire divisions of the ARVN and crushing the attempted allied counter-offensive into North Vietnam following Tet before pushing back. When General Ironside tried to purge Communism from Laos, it was the Volunteers who broke the back of his operation, and it was the Volunteers who helped to drive the Atomic Kingdom out of the country in their first probing offensives into Vietnam.

## The International Army

### Infantry

Note that all Volunteer infantry use battlesuits, making them able to shrug off most small arms fire, but it does mean that they require upgrades to deal with EMP; though they do restart back into action somewhat faster than normal if afflicted by such a pulse. They are also magnetisable, however.

### Aircraft

All Comintern Volunteer aircraft are capable of operating outside of the atmosphere due to the emphasis on sudden assaults by the Volunteers and the usage of electromagnetic thrusters.

### Deathmatch Reinforcements

Unlike a few factions. The Comintern Volunteers can choose one of five reinforcements in MFDM to supplant their main force by constructing their reinforcement building via the "Call Down (structure)" protocol. Note that once a reinforcement is chosen the other four are permanantly locked out.

**Synthetic Revolutionary Army**

An army of intelligent machines, the SRA provides endurance to the quick in-and-out combat tactics of the Volunteers. A truly ideal anvil that can both take a beating and prevent the enemy from getting any ideas of getting away from them before the Volunteers smash them to pieces, relentlessly pushing across a wide front as a tsunami. (WIP)

**Japanese Red Front**

Many citizens of the Empire still await the day of the revolution, and seek to gain experience fighting alongside the Comintern Volunteers even if they don't make the cut for either the Volunteer Army or the Revolutionary Exportation Force. The JRF are notable for the support of the secretive psychic Aka clan of Shinobi.

**Revolutionary Exportation Force Black Division**

One of the most famous divisions of the REF and their only infantry divison, Black Division specialises in sabotage and hit and run attacks, bringing the fight from where the enemy doesn't expect while making them bleed from a death of a thousand cuts from within and without, sapping away at the enemy's strength before the killing blow is dealt.

**Garibaldi Corps**

Traitors to the Syndicate and Legion Security who took all their gear and ran with it to join the communists, the Garibaldi Corps will stop at nothing to free Italy from Objectivism and the Cartels.

**Volkov Squadron**

A highly elite, all-volunteer, and secret branch within the Soviets. The Volkovs are named after the Soviets first cyborg Volkov (and Chitzkoi) where every soldier within it has made the ultimate sacrifice to have their body augmented with cybernetics to become the ultimate soldier of the Union, often times working together with the less elite Volunteers. The Squadron are the ELITES of the Soviet Union with strong potential with upgradeability and can cover a lot of ground quickly thanks to their cybernetic limbs. But their small number means that their forces will always be limited.

## Behind the Scenes

The Comintern Volunteers are derived from the suggestions of many particularly radical ultraleftists such as Amadeo Bordiga for a truly international army loyal to and beholden solely to the Comintern rather than the Soviet State or any other Socialist government.

The Comintern Volunteers are a thematic inversion of the Allied Reservists, which are the cannon fodder national armies of the Allies to the Elite International task force of the Peacekeepers while the Comintern Volunteers are the elite international task force to the national army of the USSR that the Soviet faction represents

The Comintern Volunteers, in fitting with established tradition, are influenced in large part by the Russian faction in Rise of the Reds, particularly Orlov and Aleksandr's more elite troops but with a significantly more high tech approach.

The Comintern is the first, and only, (minor) Paradox faction created far after Paradox production stopped, based on the Shadows of Nibiru PEQAN PIES project.

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