The Troubled Days of Mexico

Socialist gangs raid a village in the Mexican countryside

## Quote

"Keep safe, and keep quiet. if anyone hands you a pamphlet or asks for your commitment to a political ideology, say yes, and pledge your ardent support. Avoid trouble, avoid the wrong words, and you may remain relatively safe in these trying times" - Isaac Perez to Mexican Civilians, 2034

## Context

The Troubled Days was a roughly half a year long period of time in Mexico where political ideologies clashed in the form of widespread gangs and skirmishes, as a result of massive growth of the Nationalist and Falangist parties due to the Cultural Revitalization of 2032, which resulted in a hostile political environment similar to the times before the Spanish Civil War of 2037. This situation developed over two years, as political parties began to make more and more inflammatory comments against one another, and taking advantage of the unstable situation in Mexico by arming their members with contraband weapons. The Mexican Socialist party had held power since 2024, and consequently appeared to be the biggest threat, causing many groups to also mobilize and arm themselves in anticipation of aggression. Because of how polarized and because how many weapons were prevalent in Mexican Society, shootings resulting from differing political opinions became common, causing the first gangs to form to respond to growing violence. Eventually the situation spiraled out of control completely, causing some notable millions to flee to the border in the United States, but most still civilians still remained in Mexico, subject to extensive violence. By early 2034 roughly 15% of the population was involved in some political gang, with a majority of members being either young adults up to the age of forty.

## Overview

The Socialist Party of Mexico headed by President Pablo Ortiz, first began to recognize the threat of the Cultural Revitalization as soon as it started, immediately beginning to distribute rhetoric warning against this "revolutionary new movement that seeks to uproot Mexico and cause strife where strife was unnecessary." The rhetoric for the rise of the Mexican Falangist and Nationalist party was rather generic, calling for end to corruption in the current system and a revitalization of Mexican identity, with the Falangist taking a more extreme path in wanting to adopt the twenty seven points of Miguel Primo de Rivera of Spain. Over the course of two years these two parties grew some fifty fold, and the once clear dominance of the Mexican Socialist party was now tenuously split, with 15% for the Nationalist party, 15% for the Falangist party, and 30% for their own party. Although The Party for Catholic Democracy consisted of 30% of the population, they did not pursue any explicitly aggressive rhetoric. During the course of these two years also, Pablo Ortiz secretly ordered for the redistribution of Mexican Military Arms to his party, attempting to create the beginnings of what would be known as a "Socialist Army," and their ranks swelled to five thousand by the start of 2034. However word of this soon got out, and in a genuine concern that the Socialist Party was going to violently put down any resistance, the Nationalist and Falangist parties also began to stockpile weapons illegally, purchasing many from over the border in the United States and bringing them South. The Socialist Party in response threatened that the Nationalist parties were attempting to take over themselves, and used to justify the formal training of Socialist Corps, in defense of their ideology. Naturally the other parties followed suit, and the extensive arming and training of these Political Militias began in February.

By March, the first organized gangs were mobilized to combat the gangs of other parties, attempting to secure control of territories that would be intimidated into voting for the desired party in the next election. Socialist Rhetoric called for the gangs as an expression of National Security, while the Nationalist parties claimed that they were defending their ideology from a tyrannical force. All across Mexico, gangs of these armed militias traveled from village to village, and from neighborhoods to neighborhoods, making sure that each area was intending to vote for their respective parties in the upcoming elections in December. Whenever gangs would encounter each other in the same village or same road or even on the same street, a general firefight would break out, resulting in multiple casualties before one side decided to retreat. Although these skirmishes were initially sparse and unorganized, as time passed, these fights became extremely organized and common, with entire military agencies established to monitor the strategic situation of each party. The Falangist Commission for Territorial Defense, was a prime example of this, able to not only coordinate battles but also supply, production, and reinforcements, effectively fighting a war without outright declaring it. It was not uncommon to have skirmishes involving hundreds of shooters behind street barricades, taking week long shifts and firing upon each other, resembling trench warfare. By July of 2034 there were almost fifty thousand mobilized fighters for the Nationalist Parties, and another one Hundred thousand for the Socialist Party. Individual villages became common grounds for skirmishes, and villagers lament that skirmishes seem to at the very least a weekly occurance, with it being their responsibility to not only evacuate themselves but to clean up the mess afterwards. A refugee crisis occured, and millions attempted to flee to the United States but to no avail, and many were forced to simply linger by the border, Propaganda posters became extremely common in every possible street corner, and even previously prevalent graffiti seemed to be drowned out by inflammatory posters declaring supposedly a righteous cause. Strangely enough, because most civilians still disliked the violence, media tended to be somewhat neutural outside of political newspapers, as most news networks simply reported on the day to day violence, without showing much bias for either side. General media like soccer and television still maintained their schedules, hopelessly trying to ignore the looming situation at hand.

For another few months the same situation continued, and deaths started climbing into the thousands. Although civilian deaths and atrocities were rare, they did still happen, such as in the Burning of Callesitos Village in early August, resulting in the deaths of fifteen villagers. Gangs for the most party kept violence to strictly between each other, full well knowing not to sour their image with the general populace, although this had clearly been already done. However, intimidation and arrests of potential political enemies were common, and if gossip spread of a particular individual holding a certain political ideology, it was very rare for that person to not be arrested by the gangs themselves. All parties continuusly blamed each other for the violence, with the Falangist party leader Horatio Carlos going as far as to drag the corpse a civilian onto a public stage in Guadalajara and declare that "this is what the Socialists have done," despite the fact that the corpse was simply of one of their fighters. The central government was also in disarray, unable to contend with the massive amount of instability in the country, and effectively ceased to have any impact by August, resulting in a general state of effective Anarchy between the three parties. The United Nations deliberated on sending a peacekeeping mission in early June, and the motion was finally passed by the end of August. Thousands of peacekeepers were able to keep peace in major cities, but not enough resources were allocated for the influence to be spread in the countryside, and so while the number of violent incidents did decrease, and general stability increased, violence was still prevalent in the peripheries. Millions of refugees were finally admitted into the United States around November, living in temporary shelters and homes near the border. However the breaking point came in December of 2034, nearing the elections, when violence swelled again and the Peacekeepers were unable to deal with the massive increase of violence, forcing them to withdraw temporarily after a group of one hundred peacekeepers were surrounded and fired upon by Falangist gangs in Tijuana, killing nearly all of them. The United Nations temporarily withdrew, and denounced the Mexican government for their actions. However in all considerations, the Troubled Days officially ended upon the election of Eduardo Ramirez, a Socialist leader, due simply to the fact that each Party then officially declared war on each other on the basis of Election Fraud, starting the Mexican Civil War of 2034.

## Aftermath

The Troubled Days simply transitioned into the Mexican Civil War, due to the fact that by this point hundreds of thousands of soldiers had been mobilized on each side, and that there was also little point in trying to maintain the disguise that an official war wasn't being fought. One of the key effects of the Troubled Days however was that due to the massacre of UN peacekeepers in Tijuana, this inevitably caused the UN to end up funding the Catholic Democratic party of Mexico, and to provide general support in the form of thousands of peacekeepers. This would have huge consequences in the Civil War, as although the Catholic Democratic party never partook in the extensive violence and never even mobilized, the fact that they remained as a fourth power while the other three parties fought amongst each other would result in their eventual successes later on when joining the war to restore order. The Catholic Democratic party would also receive the blessings of the world, for explicitly not partaking in the extensive violence beforehand in The Troubled Days, even winning the support of ALPINE themselves. Besides this, having learned a lesson from the Tijuana Massacre, the United Nations from this point onwards would begin to grow more and more aggressive in their use of force, becoming more decisive and effective as a result.