Igor Panarin’s breakup scenario for the United States has been getting play in the media lately. It’s not particularly new; I remember reading about Panarin’s crackpot bullshit a couple of years ago. But it’s still extremely stupid. Seriously, take a look at this map:
That is some seriously stupid crap right there.
Okay, first off – the “Californian Republic” will be under Chinese influence? Really? Is this because of the teeming Chinese hordes along the Pacific coast who will no doubt rise up and demand the Pacific states swear fealty to the secret elder mandarins who run all China behind the scenes? (For some reason, they will also want Utah. Presumably Chinese people just love Mormons.) It’s not entirely unrealistic to suggest that Hawaii might revert to Japanese control (seeing as how it used to be under Japanese control, way back in the day), but there’s a reason Hawaii is American rather than Chinese: it’s twice as far from China as it is from the United States. Which is why the whole “Chinese control” idea is so ludicrous: the Pacific Rim states are over seven thousand kilometers away from China, so China can’t reasonably control or hope to protect them via conventional arms.
Secondly, I really love how he groups redneck conservative Appalachia – Tennessee and Kentucky and West Virginia – into the same condensed political grouping that includes Massachusetts, Connecticut and Vermont. That is what we call planning. And, of course, these states will join the European Union, which is only five thousand kilometers away as the (very tired) crow flies.
Thirdly, speaking as a Canadian, I didn’t realize we had any influence over Kansas, Colorado or South Dakota. However, this gives us Mount Rushmore, so I totally approve and we will re-carve it so that it displays John A. MacDonald, Wilfred Laurier, William Lyon Mackenzie King and Pierre Trudeau. Then the NDP will complain, so we will replace Laurier with Tommy Douglas and everybody will be happy! Except Americans, but they won’t be Americans any more so hah on them, that’s what I say.
Of course, given that Panarin openly fantasizes about Russia reclaiming Alaska and that’s really the entire point of the article (yes, I’m sure they’d want to come back to Mother Russia, Igor), it doesn’t take a lot of smarts to recognize that this is nothing more than the academic equivalent of jerking off. What’s more worrisome is that this twat and his back-of-the-napkin pontifications are actually being taken seriously by far too much of the Russian political establishment. I just hope they have better things to do then to wait around for the collapse of the United States so they can actually pretend to be a superpower again.
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Seriously, if Russia wants Sarah Palin, Don Young, and Ted Stevens that badly, they can have them.
But yes, this is classic academic asshattery. Perhaps Paul Krugman can do a column in the future in which he suggests that St. Petersburg will be annexed by Saudi Arabia and Siberia becomes a protectorate of Australia.
I note he doesn’t say which china will end up with the west coast of america, nor does he go into why either china would want the north west coast.
I’m also confused why the EU would let a failing east coast and their failing economy into the EU, or why Hawaii wouldn’t just go indepedent.
I agree, this is just insanity…but please watch it with the “Appalachian rednecks” shots at Kentucky. We’re not all hicks down here, eh?
Clearly that’s bull, since everyone knows California will be under Japanese occupation, and North America will mostly be returned into the hand of the natives due to the power of the Great Ghost Dance.
http://www.shadowrun4.com/resources/sr4/sr4_namap.pdf
Why the hell am I living under the pointy sandaled foot of the heathen Chinese? Shouldn’t Arizona be taken over by Mexico? I mean Phoenix is part of Aztlan if I recall my Shadowrun maps correctly…
I think Absolut Vodka actually did a better job.
http://theredpill67.files.wordpress.com/2008/04/absolut.jpg
In the somewhat unimaginable possibility that the US government dissolves overnight (possibly into lemon-fresh Sprite), I find it much more believable if coastal states grouped around common economic advantages (such as the Gulf States, the St. Lawrence States, the Really Just Part Of New York City States) while the midwest fell back on farming for sustenance under the rule of Protestant warlords. (Nothing in particular against Protestants — but religion makes a good nucleus for fledgling militias and in the midwest, that probably does mean Protestants.)
California maintains its independence thanks to the presence of a dragon.
When someone posted that yesterday on a forum I frequent, I honestly thought it was a joke.
I love the last paragraph in the WSJ article – Panarin uses the classic nutter argument of ‘THIS GUY DID THIS AND THEY LAUGHED AT HIM TOO YOU SEE’
i think i have more of a problem with the fact that he didn’t take into account the borders WITHIN the states…
southern california and all of AZ should be in mexico.
Eastern TN and KY, western NC, upstate SC and GA, all of WV, western VA, and even western MD (basically all of Appalachia) would be the only independent faction in all this. you do NOT mess around with hill billy america…
i think we should have given FL back to Spain years ago anyway…
i just can’t get over the fact that ALL of this state goes to England or all that state goes to Mexico.
i mean, really, would the fine people of Alabama and Mississippi (the Southern Cultured ones) really accept Mexican authority??
this picture has made me too angry to think straight. even if the US were to fall out of power and collapse, you would not see crap like this…
Panarin was obviously playing some house-ruled version of Fortress America where Canada can attack, too.
Or, alternately, that’s how their game ended, and he decided the leftover US went to Canada. (Notably, in Fortress America, the Southern invaders are blue pieces, and the Eastern invaders are red ones, so that’s almost right for an end-of-game map.)
Man, I want to get a PhD and say some stupid shit and get famous too.
Hmmm…. assuming major cities like Boston, New York, Baltimore, and Philadelphia could maintain order within themselves and collaborate to control the intervening rural and suburban areas (extending in the best case scenario down to Atlanta and across to Cleveland), would Chicago be able to join this grand alliance or would they be trapped on the other side of a Canadian invasion to stabilize the volatile Detroit-Toledo area?
For that matter, would Cleveland and Pittsburgh simply be lost amid a declaration of Amish independence?
I can tell you now, if the Greater Montreal Metro Area expects to absorb parts of New Hampshire and Vermont, Boston is going to have words with them.
Texas? Hey, America can keep that cesspool, we don’t want it back! It’s full of Texans, eeeeeeeeugh!
Yours,
Dave Silva
A Mexican.
;p
Wait.
I thought we all knew the west coast would form the NCR, a bastion of democracy.
No way we’d join the guys who nuked us.
Meh. I’d toss Borden onto the Canadian Rushmore.
Huh, don’t we keep some of our nukes in Montana? And they’d just give those to Canada no question, huh? I mean, China or whatever. I would have thought they’d have fought harder to keep that one. Same Idaho. I mean, who doesn’t love potatoes?
Heinlein’s predicted Balkanization made more sense than this, and it wasn’t all that sensible to start with. (Though it did grant posterity the glorious line, “No one understands Californian politics, including Californian politicians.”)
…
A little piece of, I think, correction is needed.
Japan was never in charge of Hawaii. If I’m wrong, please enlighten but I haven’t seen anything pointing them to being in charge of Hawaii.
So you buy McKinley’s line about the Japanese being about to take over the Kingdom of Hawaii, do you?
You realise that this is just Hanna’s ploy to rake in the cash for the House of Morgan, right?
Anything to distract the nation from free silver!
Colorado becoming part of Canada is probably the only way Colorado gays will ever get the right to marry. So there’s that, at least.
If you start throwing gay militant politics into the mix that map only gets more wrong.
I’m pretty fond of the way that the US was divvied up for the FASA game Crimson Skies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Crimson_skies_map.png
america is a country with a penis growing out of it’s bottom – exactly how much wronger can a map of it get?
What is it with frothing lunatics and maps?
The right to marry is ‘militant politics’? Good lord!
Ha ha ha ha. Missouri going to Canada. Ha ha ha ha.
Oh god, this is hysterical. THANKS FOR THE LAUGHS.
The funniest part is that it seems like he had a need to split the lower 48 into exactly 4 segments – no more, no less. For no apparent reason. And further, that none of them would remain independent, also for no apparent reason.
It’s just a big steaming mug of crazy I guess.
“nothing more than the academic equivalent of jerking off.”
I say this as someone who’s been called an academic before; I didn’t realize academia had any other point besides its being the equivalent of mental masturbation.
Well. Mostly, anyway.
I think the thing I find most odd is the other countries thing; I’ve thought it in some ways makes more sense to divide the US into several federal territories, especially concerning politics and religion. We could federally allocate a single state where schools could teach intelligent design and allow school prayer and whatever, kinda like “Give Texas to the conservative religious fundamentalists and let them have their own Christian nation so the rest of us can make some progress.”
@Fraction Jackson: agreed. There should probably be at least seven. Although he seems to think Atlantic America will at least preserve its own identity, as it “may join” the EU, whereas the other territories will be under someone else’s control or influence. Which makes sense, given that it includes New York, Boston, Philadelphia, DC, and Baltimore; I can’t imagine it wouldn’t be able to maintain a strong government.
In Colorado? Kinda.
This reminds me of tales of white supremacists in the late eighties and early nineties. They too advocated the dissolution of the United States, in their case based upon, well, you can guess. Among these jagweeds circulated a semi-famous map that divided the Union into new, ethnically pure “nations.” You could probably find it on the interwebs if you look. (I’d rather not.)
What makes that legendary klan-map so great is that it came from a cereal box. Yes, yes, it did. The map was from the back of a Kix Cereal box that divided the country up for a contest.
I did not make this up.
If the US did break up it wouldn’t go that way, like many of you guys are saying. I’m guessing Texas would be it’s own country, the other sourthwestern states would either be a country or part of Mexico, New England would be a country, the southeastern states would be a country where blacks and gays wouldn’t want to live. I’ll agree with Will that the mid-Atlantic states would stay united or with New England.
Anyway, I am curious as to what situation brings on the fall of the federal government and why we would get to that situation. The article doesn’t give any specifics.
The fact that Mexico would be able to take over (much less keep) any state is laughable. Texas would become it’s own country (again) and would keep Mexico at bay. Hell, the Mexicans living in Texas would probably help out.
You know, I’m pretty sure this guy just picked up an old second edition Shadowrun Handook and messed with the map a little (Obviously, he assumes the Indians aren’t getting their magic back. Fool!)
Um, I admit I just have a BS (haha) in Business and not a PhD in asshattery like this Russian Professor…
But even I know enough about socio-political whatsits to realize this is just completely freaking absurd.
Still, it was a very amusing read.
So let me get this straight.
The entire United States has just collapsed as a governmental body. Other countries are making claims on former US states.
And they’re for some reason respecting (for the most part) fairly arbitrary borders? Yeah, right. I expect shit to be divided up based on rivers, lakes, mountains, not imaginary lines in the fucking sand. Not to mention Washington not going over to Canada, but rather to CHINA? Or Alaska, for that matter. Or is Palin’s invasion theory come true?
What’s most telling is that he assumes that all these new states would fall under someone else’s influence. There is no reason that this would be true. Even in the (unlikely) case that the U.S. breaks up at all, and along those lines, most of those new states would have the resources to support and defend themselves once the dust clears. And while the dust is still in the air, I think the international establishment would kind of freak out at the idea of a land grab in the First World.
What’s more likely is that if the U.S. stops being a superpower (ok, when the U.S. stops being a superpower) it will be as the result of a long decline or a catastrophic economic collapse that will not blossom into full-fledged civil war. Look at the end of the British or Turkish empires for examples not – you called it – masturbatory civil war scenarios.
I like how this implies that while the US has horribly, horribly collapsed, other countries with close ties to the US (China, Japan, Canada, Mexico) are all perfectly OK.
I think we Canadians should be rather touched that this crazy dude thinks we can bring 70 million* americans under our influence.
And that shadowrun map is a long way off, I mean, things don’t even start until 2012 do they? Or had the US started disintegrating by then?
*approx, I added the numbers on wikipedia, but maybe I got them wrong
“And that shadowrun map is a long way off, I mean, things don’t even start until 2012 do they? Or had the US started disintegrating by then?”
First, the Supreme Court needs to officially recognize the right of U.S. corporations to man and field their own militias to protect their overseas interests. Then comes the first generation of goblinization.
The Great Ghost Dance hits during the first goblinization panic and that touches off the dissolution of Canada, the U.S., and Mexico. The zombie/vampire plague takes Europe, Insect cults make their first appearance, and Dunkelzel makes his appearance in America. After Dunekzel’s assassination, enough dragons create sufficient public power bases to become political entities, which is when you see the Tir, Aztlan, and Amazonian form.
Then we nuke Chicago.
>>Then we nuke Chicago.
That’s the best part. Though technically, Ares Corporation nukes Chicago…
I would have split the US as such.
Everything North of West Virginia and East of Ohio would become its own country. If they did form an alliance with anyone, it would be most likely be with Europe, but it would not share its economy.
Virginia, Kentucky, Arkansas, Texas and all points south would form its own country, immediately establish a theocracy and try to suck Florida and Texas dry until those two break off and leave everything between the Gulf and Ohio to wither and die.
West Virginia would split in two between the southern country and the northeastern country.
Minnesota, Wisconsin and the UP of Michigan would definitely want to join Canada (assuming its still in one piece too). Iowa, Illinois (Chicago, at least), Michigan and Ohio would most likely follow suit because they wont want to deal with the idiots to the West of them. Although, Canada would most likely not want to take in Detroit (who could blame them, eh?) because of all the crime.
Washington and Oregon would go Canadian too.
California would break down entirely and become a feudal system, which Hollywood will broadcast live to the world as a new 24/7 reality TV Show.
Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona will be the only unknown. They each have decent economies and appear to not be heavily influenced by the religious stupidity that flows freely through Utah, Kansas and points North. So they might go on their own, or they might form an alliance with either Japan or South America (No chance they’d go to Latin America).
Alaska would go out on its own and spend the next 50 years pretending anyone noticed or cared.
Hawaii would declare independence and most likely form an alliance with New Zealand because they’re both major tourist attractions.
All the other states would empty out and become a total wasteland except for the libertarians and bible humpers who will immediately declare the barren wasteland to be a free market utopia, in which the quality of life will only go downhill from that point on.
Hawaii was never under Japanese control. The US has been in control of Hawaii since they helped overthrow the Hawaiian monarchy at the end of the 19th century. The Japanese did attack Hawaii once back in the day, though…it didn’t stick.
You might be thinking about the large Japanese-American population in the islands, but that’s due to immigration…not, y’know, conquest.
And yeah, given a choice, if the US collapsed, I’d guess that Hawaii would go back to being a sovereign nation. I hear that Senator Akaka is ready to present President Obama with a bill granting native Hawaiians sovereign status, like the other indigenous nations on the continent.
i’ve thought about this some more, and i politely demand that you, MightyGodKing (dot com), rig up a map (or maps) of other nations in this manner.
Let’s see Canada, Mexico, the state of Maryland, Africa, the moon, and Narnia…
Hawaii has been wrestling with sovereignty ever since it was annexed (that’s right, boys and girls, we streaked past all the other European nations to grab our own tropical paradise). I’d love to think that it could be independent, but we’re too well-positioned for all that we’re in the center of nowhere. Besides that, we have incredibly inefficient government. The fact that the Akaka bill is not yet passed (I think), and native Hawaiians are not recognized as a first people by the U.S. government, is as much a commentary on the sovereignty movement as D.C. What would we give them? We don’t have enough land or resources for everyone here now, all forms of gambling are illegal including lotteries, and people who get scholarships for college don’t always come back. The number of pure Hawaiians is miniscule at this point.
On a different note, we tend to be an even mix of Japanese and American cultural influences, so Japan is a decent bet. Although why they need us is beyond me. They are not exactly a tower of military strength at this point. In the same vein, New Mexico would probably go to the Republic of Texas (part of Mexico my ass, they’re big enough to be their own country), even though there’s not much but space in the western states. We also have lots of irradiated land for the taking.
I vote for a map of the Moon and Antarctica as well.
Well if this scenario were true, Canada would be the big winner. Since the part of the US that they are getting is pretty much the bread basket of the entire fucking world (or would be without the US government subsidies); it contains most of the US tactical nuclear installations, ALL of the best Air installations (the B2 Stealths are in Missouri); not to mention a significant portion of the infrastructure necessary to maintain a dominant control of the automobile industry.
Colorado not heavily influenced by religious stupidity? Oh, if only that were true….
And in any near future where the US fell apart, Alaska would be freakin’ *sacked* by whoever got there first, for all the oil that may (or may not) be under its lovely wilderness. Sort of like in Palin’s wet dreams, but done by somebody else instead of by Republicans.
What is it with frothing lunatics and maps?
Er, though it is indisputable that Ralph “Blood ‘n’ Guts” Peters is a frothing lunatic, there is one thing that leaps off the “after” map in the linked post: “ISRAEL (pre-1967 borders)”. Which makes frothing lunatic Ralph saner about the Occupied Territories than either the Israeli or the US government. And that’s just depressing.
The mentions of Narnia remind me of it cropping up on every map on The Late Late Show.
I think if we had to respect state borders due to arbitrary rules, California would set off on its own (due to being one of the largest economies in the world with tech, entertainment, and agricultural industries), as might Illinois and Texas (I’m not so sure about Texas’s industries). California even has a fault line from which it could set off into the ocean using fictitious super-science. Can you tell I used to live there?
What’s more depressing:
A.That this isn’t simply an old Communist’s wet dream and even .01% plausible
or
B.That this professor had a segment on FOX News yesterday morning…and nobody laughed.
Addendum:
This guy clearly does not know America because we have pretty well-defined cultural and political boundaries…
New England(Maine, NH, Vermont, NY, Conn., Mass., RI)*CANADA*
New York/New Jersey*INDEPENDENT*
Mid-Atlantic(Penn., Maryland, Delaware, Virginia)*REMAINING U.S.A.*
The South(NC, SC, Georgia, Florida, Kentucky, Tenn., Alabama, Miss., Arkansas, Louisiana, Texas)*CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA)
Midwest(Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Minnesota)*CANADA*
The Plains(Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, The Dakotas, Oklahoma, Wyoming)*WHO THE HELL KNOWS? WASTELAND? LIKE IN JUDGE DREDD THE MOVIE.*
Southwest(Arizona, New Mexico)*MEXICO*
Pacific Northwest(Washington, Oregon, Montana, Idaho)*CANADA*
Utah*MORMONS FINALLY GET THEIR OWN COUNTRY*
California*INDEPENDENT*
Alaska*INDEPENDENT*
Hawaii*INDEPENDENT*
The only states I can’t really put into a specific region are Colorado and West Virginia.
The ski resort cities will cede from everyone else and go out like Monaco or The Vatican – basically just independent resort states.
West Virginia will keep interbreeding until the population becomes a whole new species.
No way New York turns control over to Canada. There is no rationale to support the notion that it would.
Its like a Filipino being elected as the Grand Wizard of the Klu Klux Klan – you just don’t waste time to think of such scenarios.
“Its like a Filipino being elected as the Grand Wizard of the Klu Klux Klan ”
Which is in and of itself – a funny notion. I wonder if they wear their little hoodies when they vote on who is their ‘leader’.
The Akaka bill hasn’t passed yet, IIRC, but I think Obama is on record for Hawaiian sovereignty. So, if it can clear Congress it’ll happen. Probably.
There’s no reason why a sovereign Hawaiian nation couldn’t open casinos, even if state laws forbid it. I say, go for it!
An independent Hawaii would have value as a vital shipping port, besides the geopolitical/military importance. Hawaii’s got a lot of leverage as a conduit between East and West. Given Japan’s own long ongoing financial problems, I don’t think they would be too significant in any alliances formed by an independent Hawaii; China would be a huge player, given their current trade dominance.
I think if we had to respect state borders due to arbitrary rules, California would set off on its own (due to being one of the largest economies in the world with tech, entertainment, and agricultural industries)
Arnold could finally be President-for-life!
This supposed breakup scheme reminds me a lot of the Phillip K. Dick novel Man in a High Tower, in which the US was defeated in WWII.
While I don’t find this partitioning likely or even convincing, I do like to see projections of an apocalyptic future map of the US. It’s the SciFi nerd in me.
For those like like fictional maps, see the GammaWorld campaign map.
I’m just looking at that map and ROTFLMGAO. My Gods, that Russian idiot can’t tell economic-political separate from his socio-political, probably he can’t tell his ass from his elbow either!
I mean, for God’s sake, New England is NOT going to ally itself to Appalachian states like Kentecky or Tennessee. Hell, NEW YORK won’t be a part of the equation: they’ll probably form their own independent state. Just like Texas would: there’s no way the “Republic of Texas” would include Florida or Alabama or even Arkansas and Oklahoma.
If the United States does fracture into economic/social regional enclaves, the larger states like California, Texas, New York and Florida would most likely form independent single states. From that, things would break down into regions: with New England centered around Massachusetts, Pennsylvania merging with New Jersey, the mid-Atlantic merge with Maryland, Delaware, Virginia and North Carolina (which now has more in common with Virginia population-wise than South Carolina). South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee and Kentucky merging in an SEC East format while Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana merging an SEC West coalition (they could still co-opt as one regional group, but again it depends on economics: if the country divides over cultural issues they would merge). Arkansas might merge with them, or perhaps with Missouri, however that state goes. The Great Lakes region would merge with West Virginia going with Ohio alongside Indiana and Michigan. Although WV shares more cultural links to Kentucky and Virginia, the upper Appalachian state is more blue-collar industrial and shares more economic issues with Ohio and Pennsylvania. Illinois is a wild card: it could go independent, but being landlocked it would feel the pressure to join either the Great Lakes/Midwest merger or the Mississippi River/Midwest coalition that would form with Minnesota, the Dakotas, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma. Wisconsin could also go with the Great Lakes alliance with Michigan, but it could pull to Minnesota. Missouri will be in the same fix as Illinois. Montana, Wyoming and Colorado will form a Rocky Mountains group. New Mexico will be ‘merged’ with Texas and no longer exist. Nevada will be merged also with California and no longer exist. Arizona will be forced into an independent status on its own, trapped between Cali and Texas. Washington State will join with Oregon and Idaho in a Pacific Northwest alliance, and could well steal northern California (everything north of San Francisco) away. Alaska and Hawaii, both physically separate from the mainland states already, will form independent states of their own.
Once the nation shatters into each of these pieces, prepare for border wars between: Texas and the Midwest alliances over Mexican trade routes; Florida vs. the SEC over water rights; California vs. the Pacific Northwest over the annexation of northern Cal. Mexico and Canada will be overwhelmed with refugees. Jamaica will rise up as an economic powerhouse to counter a Cuba divided by civil war (without a United States bullying them into a united cause, Cubans will rise up against the Castro regime). The UN will refuse to leave New York City because they can still break a lot of traffic laws there. It will be… utter chaos.
😉 How’s THAT, you Russian n00b? I got Harry Turtledove on line 3 asking for the novel rights. Snerk.
man…if i said some stupid ass shit like this they’d throw me in the loony bin
but if someone with a PhD says it oh man that’s a plausible theory
i wouldn’t mind becoming part of Canada though 😛
Guess what Igor? 2011 and we still have not broken up. Guess you don’t get Alaska.
Also, a bunch of you people have been saying stuff about radiation in the comments. when did Igors theory say anything about radiation?
Ironically here in the future space year to 2011 it looks like the Eurozone is coming undone, but America shows no signs of coming apart. Eh, I’ll give it another thirty years before global climate change kicks in. Who knows what the future holds.