Rodion Gordunov

Rodion Gordunov was born on 3 May 2148 in the city of New Severodvinsk on Mystic 4. He was known for his political interests from an early age, and was one of the foremost proponents of the "moneyless society" theory of economics, which began to be very popular in the Protectorate from about the year 2170; after the fall of the Empire and the Bandorian victory in the Twenty Years' War over a thousand years later, this became one of the dominant ideological beliefs of the Protectorate, although it took until the year 4650 for the Protectorate to fully implement the transition to a moneyless society. Because of his theories about this, Gordunov was considered one of the Protectorate's best sociologists of his time. When Supreme Leader Xia Shang resigned from office due to health concerns on 25 July 2180, she nominated Gordunov as her successor. His nomination was approved by a council of 157 senior Bandorian scientists and military officials, and on 27 July he was sworn in as the next Supreme Leader of the Protectorate. Gordunov began a series of sweeping social reforms designed to reduce corruption; he continued the massive exploration, colonization and terraforming programs begun by Shang, increased recruiting for the armed forces of the Protectorate, and increased government-funded research into cloning and genetic experimentation. Gordunov had, to some extent, foreseen the Union's military buildup at this time, and made sure to organize the outlying sectors of the Protectorate; the Protectorate Navy gained its Fourth Fleet under Gordunov, which was organized to guard the newest colonies; he also appointed Vasily Spiakov as the governor of Nodogorov . Despite the addition of a fourth fleet, the Protectorate Navy at this time was much smaller than its Union counterpart; officials such as Viktor Jenkov and Lu Weng , then a Grand Admiral in the Protectorate Navy, helped to keep it deployed in as efficient a manner as possible. On 23 March 2189, the Bandorian colony of New Arkhangelsk , along with seven other smaller Bandorian colonies, was attacked by Union forces. Gordunov ordered reprisal attacks by the Protectorate's Second and Third Fleets, while the Fourth Fleet was deployed to assist system defense forces in driving out the invaders from those systems. The war continued; Gordunov's tactics were widely successful, and the Union was slowly forced onto the defensive. Then Union spy networks managed to plant an agent who would come into contact with Gordunov; this agent managed to kill him using nanites transferred through a handshake, on 4 July 2190; the nanites infiltrated his bloodstream, collected in his heart, then released a powerful neurotoxin. Vasily Spiakov was appointed the next Supreme Leader; his cautious strategy unfortunately allowed the Union Navy to regain the offensive, and ultimately Spiakov was forced to flee to the Darkstar system, forming a Bandorian government in exile, while Lu Weng took over most of the former Protectorate armed forces after pulling off a brilliant victory, and declared himself the Emperor of the Galactic Empire. With the backing of 90% of the Protectorate Navy and 75% of the Protectorate Army, Weng was able to solidify control over most of the former Bandorian systems. Gordunov lived on through his theory, however, and if he had seen the Protectorate 2500 years later he would most likely have been proud.