American Strategic Deception Bureau

　Of course, no matter how happy we are, this barbaric and brutal imperialist behavior must be criticized.

　The massacre left loyal ministers and righteous men utterly devastated, and the bodies of toiling peasants and workers littered the land. Across the country, blood flowed, and millions lay dead. Nasution and his followers, over an unequal distribution of the spoils, immediately began to fight among themselves, and the Coconut City (Jakarta) was practically reduced to ruins.

　Whenever a country has internal troubles, external troubles will inevitably arise. Nasution was incompetent in governing the country and was abandoned by the United States. The White House also decided to split the country into two states.

　Soon after, the US military re-entered Coconut City, and the traitors panicked, bowing their heads and hanging their necks, hoping for their lives. Thus, Indonesia's foundation was destroyed, its vast territory shattered, and its twelve kingdoms were divided, each fighting and fighting against the other. It was unknown when they would be unified again, and Southeast Asia was also in turmoil because of this..."

　In the magnificent living room, Bernard, the eldest brother of the King family and currently a member of the House of Representatives, paced back and forth in a restless mood. Meanwhile, Colonel Ferry King sat on the sofa, reciting in a cadence an editorial from Hong Kong's Ta Kung Pao on the disintegration of Indonesia.

　To be honest, what surprised him a little was that the Hong Kong newspapers of this era did not seem to be like the era before he traveled through time, where anti-China self-hatred and hatred of the mainland had penetrated into their bones, and even their positions could make a 180-degree turn at any time to follow the anti-China trend.

　——For example, last year people were still singing the praises of green environmental protection, but this year they are cursing that trams are useless, etc.

　Instead, he still has a bit of literary spirit and some patriotism, and he will not confuse right and wrong on many major issues.

　Just like Jin Yong's martial arts novels, even if they contain some dark material and attack certain people and certain things, they generally do not reach the level of "Wolf Totem" and "Ugly Chinese" that completely deny their own nation and civilization and want to uproot them.

　——No matter how many selfish ideas there are in Jin Yong’s novels, it seems that he never praises Mongolia and the Jin Dynasty, or claims that the Han people are inherently inferior and need to be colonized, right?

　What's more, although Jin Yong's satire was harsh, the mainland at that time was indeed in a mess, so it was normal to be scolded.

　When commenting on the disintegration of Indonesia, even right-wing Hong Kong newspapers have not been boasting that "the smaller the country, the more democratic it is, and the smaller the territory, the more progressive it is." Instead, they have been very traditional in lamenting the collapse of a "great country" and expressing their "pity for the misfortune and anger at the Indonesians for not fighting back."

　Hong Kong newspapers didn't coin counterintuitive terms like "patriotic traitors" and "traitorous heroes" to praise and glorify Nasution's two henchmen, Suharto, who single-handedly led to Indonesia's downfall. Instead, they quite naturally compared them to Shi Jingtang, the puppet emperor who ceded the Sixteen Prefectures of Yanyun to the Khitan a thousand years earlier—so normal it almost didn't seem like a Hong Kong newspaper.

　Of course, the newspapers in mainland China today were even more abnormal, bordering on insanity. With the publication of that furious article criticizing "Hai Rui Dismissed from Office," the unbearable decade of chaos officially began, and the entire country was quickly thrust into a vortex of absurdity and madness...

　Confused thoughts, confusion of right and wrong, overturned values, rampant verbal and physical struggles... The price of ten years of madness has not been paid in fifty years.

　Therefore, in the next few years, the editorials in mainland newspapers may not be as normal as the comments in Hong Kong newspapers!

　Then, when he read the word "Twelve Kingdoms," Fili suddenly remembered a nearly forgotten Japanese fantasy light novel, "The Twelve Kingdoms," even before his time travel. The novel's content was quite ordinary, but the Chinese-style soundtrack of the animated adaptation was truly captivating and memorable. So, he paused his reading, looked at the map of Indonesia on his desk, and counted on his fingers:

　Java, Aceh, the Federation of Sumatra, Madura, South Kalimantan, South Maluku, North Maluku, South Sulawesi, North Sulawesi, East Timor, West Timor, West Irian, Bali under the US trusteeship, and Sumba Island under the Australian trusteeship.

　Well, then we have to deduct East Timor, which is still a Portuguese colony, has not yet officially gained independence, and has never been ruled by Indonesia.

　If you calculate it this way, there really were twelve countries in Indonesia’s former territory, and you could stage a "Twelve Kingdoms"!

　Haha, with the fall of Indonesia, the number of countries in Southeast Asia has doubled in an instant.

　Not to mention, the situation of these twelve countries coexisting is just the beginning, not the final outcome.

　Many new small countries that had just split from Indonesia started killing each other before they even had the chance to set up their own makeshift teams.

　For example, the Sumatra Federation, sandwiched between Java and Aceh, had not yet established a new government when a civil war broke out due to ethnic issues. Aceh, Java, Singapore and Malaysia all took the opportunity to intervene, and as a result, Sumatra Island was almost turned into a pirate den.

　In South Kalimantan, where the Indonesian Communist Party (PTI) still operates, warlords and tribes are engaged in a chaotic struggle, unable to elect a new government that can even remotely win the support of the people. As for the isolated Natuna Islands in the South China Sea, they are even clamoring for independence.

　There is no way around it. The American voting system is born with a divisive gene. It's a disease from the womb and there is no cure!

　Therefore, the fact that Indonesia is currently being dismembered into twelve countries by the US military is probably just the beginning. It will continue to disintegrate in the flames of war and evolve into sixteen or even twenty countries competing for hegemony. This is probably the final stage of Indonesia's disintegration, right?

　Of course, if there were no external forces intervening, the Java Republic under Suharto, with its size advantage of having more than half of Indonesia's population,

　It seems that there is still hope in gradually conquering all the countries and unifying Indonesia again.

　However, with the big tiger of the United States squatting at home and the neurotic "paper cat" of Australia watching covetously from behind, it is probably more difficult for the Javanese Republic, which has only tens of thousands of square kilometers of land left, to become a complete Indonesia again than it was for Putin the Great to rebuild the Soviet Union.

　Australia is certainly a "paper cat" that's not even a paper tiger. But Indonesia is also just a paper mouse that no one can defeat!

　Paper cat and paper mouse, this is an excellent matching mechanism in the Nanyang region!

　Firi sighed in his heart, then picked up last month's edition of Ta Kung Pao again and continued to read a few sentences.

　But he was interrupted by his brother, Congressman Bernard, with an irritated look on his face: "Dear Fili, my brother, you don't have to show off your Chinese skills anymore! No one in the family cares about what's happening in Indonesia right now! The only thing we have to worry about right now is the midterm elections! Fili! Your brother is about to lose the election!"

　——The president of the United States is elected every four years, while the term of office of members of the House of Representatives is even shorter, only two years.

　1966 was the year of the midterm elections, and it was a hurdle that all members of the House of Representatives on Capitol Hill, including Bernard, had to overcome.

　Unfortunately, the overall election situation of the Democratic Party this year is a mess and terrible.

　But Fieri's eldest brother, Bernard, is a Democratic congressman. Now that he is about to lose the election, how can he not be anxious?

　In fact, the entire Kim family was worried about this matter - since Bernard was elected to the House of Representatives and walked into Capitol Hill, the Kim family has barely stepped into the threshold of the American upper class: only one foot in, and is still far from those famous families and political families.

　If Bernard loses the House of Representatives election this time and fails to be elected several times in a row, the Jin family's path to success will come to an abrupt end, and the American upper-class society of fame and fortune, which has just opened a door to the Jin family, will unceremoniously drive the Jin family back into the circle of ordinary rich people.

　Moreover, without any political support at home to rely on, it would become extremely difficult for Firi to become a general in the future.

　——It is very likely that you will have to endure it for your entire life, and only when you retire will the Pentagon give you the brigadier general's shoulder straps purely for consolation purposes.

　"Dear brother, if you really fail in your House of Representatives campaign this time, the most direct reason will be the opening of the Indonesian battlefield! So, how can you say that the war in Indonesia has nothing to do with your political career?"

　Ferry put down the newspaper and said to his eldest brother Bernard with a serious expression, "If the Indonesian battlefield had not been opened, Thailand would not have been taken advantage of by the Viet Cong and collapsed. Generals Westmoreland and Abrams would not have asked the Pentagon for at least 500,000 reinforcements, and President Johnson would not have launched his "One Million Man Draft Plan," which caused an uproar across the country and caused the Democratic Party's support rate to plummet.

　And you, brother, don't have the courage or wherewithal to take on the role of opposition within the party, to organize and lead an anti-war movement, to challenge the White House's tune... So, what other outcome can you have, other than being dragged down to defeat by President Johnson and the warmongers around him?"

　Having said that, he looked up at the rows of shelves and blackboards around him. There were various clippings hanging with ropes and stuck with glue. The contents were all bad news about the ruling Democratic Party's worrying election situation, the surging anti-war movement, and the cynicism about the draft.

　This made Fili sigh helplessly:

　This is truly a case of "the president is mobilizing troops and the Democratic Party has suffered a major defeat"!

　conflict.

　President Johnson's White House cabinet was simply deceiving itself with a black-and-white attitude, believing that all countries on the other side of the Iron Curtain were a whole, all obeying Moscow and following the Kremlin's baton. Based on the above-mentioned erroneous thinking, it stubbornly refused to relax or take even a small step back anywhere - because the Democratic Party considered itself to be on the left, and was even more afraid of being caught by domestic conservative forces.

　The result is the strange situation where the left seems to be even more extreme right than the right: in fact, it all comes down to the president's lack of courage.

　Under the guidance of this hardline approach of "no distinction between primary and secondary, no concessions, and no mercy," what other outcome could there be except an escalation of the war?

　Even more terrible is that, in its history, the United States, while knowing that it should divide and rule, using one faction to fight another, always accurately identified the weakest faction and tried to support it, only to find that the weakest faction was too weak to support, and finally ended up getting angry and personally taking action, thus getting stuck in the quagmire.

　——The rigid Cold War mentality + miscalculation of its own strength and strategic delivery capabilities have resulted in the United States always fighting painful and disastrous wars.

　In short, in order to cope with the expansion of the battlefield, to suppress and eliminate the pirates that appeared along the coast of the Strait of Malacca, to deal with the low-intensity wars throughout the South Seas, and to hunt down the remaining communist guerrillas, the Pentagon had to sell everything it had and tear down Peter to pay Paul, in order to put together an unprecedentedly large field group for General Westmoreland stationed in Singapore to carry out military missions in the vast war zone of over one million square kilometers.

　At the same time, the Indochina Peninsula battlefield, which has been losing ground since the Vietnam War officially broke out, is in urgent need of more fresh troops to fill the gap.

　As the nation increasingly resisted conscription and the anti-war movement intensified, conventional conscription methods and the bizarre and unusual recruits brought in by Secretary of Defense McNamara through the 100,000 Man Plan were far from enough to meet the huge needs of the front lines.

　So, taking advantage of the easy victory in the Second Battle of Jakarta and the rise in public support—Americans, after all, follow the strong and admire the victor—President Johnson confidently launched his "One Million Man Draft"! It was a "Presidential Massive Draft"!

　In fact, as soon as President Johnson's draft plan began to take shape, a large number of Democratic members expressed their complete disapproval. No matter how the Democratic whips threatened, they could not get the entire party to vote in favor of the president's "One Million Man Draft Plan."

　As a result, President Johnson put aside his own party's opposition and carried out a fruitful bipartisan cooperation with the pro-war Republican congressmen, barely passing the "One Million Man Draft Plan" with a very narrow vote advantage in both the Senate and the House of Representatives.

　It also completely kicked the United States into the abyss of war with no end in sight.

　What kind of warmongering plan is this "One Million Man Recruitment Plan"?

　The main point of the order was that, in order to cope with the escalating war and to recruit an additional one million soldiers within a year, the Johnson administration ordered a significant relaxation of conscription requirements. Not only were the sick, the mentally retarded, the disabled, and new immigrants who couldn't speak English included in the draft, but the conscription age was also extended to 18 to 35 years old, and the exemptions for college students and married people were completely abolished. From then on, if you were a US citizen and at least 24 years old, regardless of whether you were still in school or married, you had to immediately serve in the military!

　In addition, even if you are under 24 years old, as long as the conscription office fails to recruit the required number of people locally, you are still obliged to serve in the army!

　As a result, even boxing champion Ali, who had only four years of education and had dyslexia, was stunned when he received the draft card from the Pentagon.

　——Does this mean he should go to the rainforest to box with the Viet Cong guerrillas?

　Of course, even more unfortunate are those American test-takers who are studying day and night for graduate studies and want to take master's and doctoral exams. These arrogant intellectuals find that even if they are well-educated and have outstanding IQs, they cannot prevent themselves from becoming cannon fodder. Naturally, they are all furious and frustrated.

　There's no way around it. It's not that the Pentagon's recruiters are crazy and are obsessed with taking advantage of college students and forcing them to join the army, but that these people are really the most suitable for military service - there is no concept of "weak scholars" in the United States, and athletes among college students are more popular than liberal arts students!

　Generally speaking, those who can afford to go to college are generally from middle-class families. They have stable economic conditions and a good upbringing, which leads to better physical fitness. Unlike those children from poor families who may appear strong but actually have all sorts of ailments.

　For example, during World War I, American recruiting officials discovered that many young men had terrible eyesight and poor teeth, resulting in a 30% rejection rate. By the time of World War II, in some heavily polluted traditional industrial areas of the United States, a staggering 70% of young men who enlisted failed physical examinations!

　Well, can such poor people, drinking "sweet water" flowing from lead pipes and breathing air full of harmful chemicals, have a good physical condition?

　At most, it is only slightly better than the starving people who have been malnourished since childhood and suffer from multiple parasitic diseases, right?

　Therefore, in order to recruit the best quality cannon fodder for the army, the recruiting officers naturally had to focus on domestic universities and try their best to recruit young college students.

　Just like in the Ming Dynasty in China, if all the scholars and candidates were taken away as soldiers, it would be absolutely a disaster.

　Just like the highest quality soldiers.

　But the question is, what is the cost? Have you ever asked the college students who were drafted what they think?

　During the same period, China simply implemented the "Up to the Countryside" campaign, which allowed educated young people to leave the cities and go to the countryside to work as farmers to repair the earth. However, this was considered extremely cruel and abused by intellectuals, and it later gave rise to the scar literature full of resentment that was popular in China for decades.

　And President Johnson actually wanted to send educated young people across the ocean to the battlefields of Vietnam. Amid the stench of corpses and the smoke of gunpowder, they would be thoroughly "re-educated" by bullets, landmines, and roadside bombs, only to return with missing limbs... Do you think they would be furious and criticize the Vietnam War as completely worthless?

　Well, I have to criticize President Johnson and trample on him like a thousand feet! Otherwise, wouldn’t all the years of suffering I endured in Vietnam be in vain?

　——Since the place where American educated youth went to the countryside to work was the front line of the Vietnam War, the Vietnam War naturally became the target of American scar literature.

　The war was subsequently angrily criticized by American culture for half a century, to the point where draft dodging became a badge of honor. Even into the 21st century, right-wing conservatives in the United States still couldn't rehabilitate the Vietnam War: it offended an entire generation.

　Not to mention, there are countless young newlyweds who have just held their wedding and have not even finished their honeymoon, but are dragged into the battlefield to sacrifice their lives - the scene of men being afraid of separation from their loved ones on the one hand, and afraid that their wives will cheat on them on the other hand, is really heartbreaking!

　How can I describe this situation? It's a bit like the poem "The Stone-Harrow Officer" by the great poet Du Fu, right?

　Of course, if the "President's call for troops" is to organize a war to defend the country against invasion and local resistance, then under the blessing of simple patriotic feelings, most traditional American white citizens will grit their teeth and join the army to fight, no matter how much sacrifice and blood they have to pay.

　But this is actually an overseas war taking place on the other side of the ocean. No matter how passionately and eloquently those conservatives who do not want to go to the battlefield speak, the young people who actually have to serve in the military do not recognize any reason why they must participate in the war, and everyone is full of resentment.

　——When Britain conquered India, if it had not used wealth to lure adventurers, but instead forcibly conscripted millions of soldiers in the country and forced the people to cross the ocean to die for free, then there would probably have been a rebellion in the country before India was conquered.

　In the end, all this anger and resentment were directed at the almighty President Johnson and the current ruling Democratic Party of the United States.

　The result was that the 1966 midterm elections had just begun when the Democratic Party's poll numbers were already bleak, something that could be described as an avalanche or a landslide.

　Congressmen who supported the White House's war policies were often shunned in local elections, their campaign speeches met with rotten eggs and rotten vegetables. In California, anti-war sentiment exploded to the point where it was impossible to suppress it.

　Of all the Democratic congressmen in California, Bernard is definitely not the most hated. But he doesn't have a distinct personal style either. He simply uses his Irish Catholic identity to win votes from his own community and fellow believers... He's the type who engages in identity politics and lacks a personal philosophy.

　Therefore, in the situation where the Democratic Party is facing a major headwind in the election, a mediocre person like him has the worst ability to resist risks and is the easiest to be eliminated.

　Not to mention, in this midterm election, the Democrats’ defeat in California was not just a small defeat, but a near complete failure!

　It's important to remember that California's emergence as a deep blue state, firmly supporting the Democratic Party, wasn't a phenomenon until the 21st century. Prior to that, in the 20th century, California had numerous Republican governors and a state legislature often dominated by Republicans, often presenting itself as a "red state."

　On the contrary, before 1964, Texas was a "deep blue state" with strong support. In the 15 presidential elections in the first 60 years of the 20th century, Texas voted for the Republican Party only once, and supported the Democratic Party candidates in the other 14 times. It can be said to be a die-hard supporter of the Donald Trump Party.

　Of course, over the next few decades, the Donald Trump and the Elephant Democrats will start swapping places, with California becoming increasingly blue and Texas increasingly red, gradually becoming the very states they once hated! (Although it's said that due to the large number of illegal immigrants, Texas is turning blue again.)

　From this we can see that even if the Democratic Party's little donkeys fall into the abyss in California's midterm elections and gain nothing, it seems not impossible for the Republican elephants to be proud and repeat the "California is all red" scene?

　-

　"I know that the Democratic Party's poll numbers are very unfavorable in this year's midterm elections, but to what extent are they unfavorable?"

　Fieri asked his older brother, Bernard, a congressman, "What the newspapers say is so shocking. I want to hear your true feelings."

　"I'm afraid it's worse than the most pessimistic forecasts in the newspapers, my dear brother. Otherwise I wouldn't be so anxious."

　Bernard sighed. "We definitely won't be able to hold onto that Senate seat up for election this year, and out of the fifty-five House seats, our party can probably only hold onto one or two—well, if that nigger Willie Brown does well, maybe we can hold onto three."

　Willy Brown? Why does this guy sound familiar?

　Oh, I remember now, it was the future "King of Laughter" Harris

　, or Kamala Harris’s mistress!

　However, compared to the King of Comedy, who only emerged in the 21st century, Willie Brown was already a prominent figure during the Vietnam War. As early as the 1950s, this dark-skinned, small-town test-taker overcame numerous obstacles to obtain a doctorate in law and practiced law for several years. He then joined Martin Luther King, Jr., in the Black Civil Rights Movement and fought on the front lines of political struggle.

　In the 1960s, Willie Brown became the leader of the black movement on the West Coast, and was known as a hero alongside Martin Luther King on the East Coast.

　Of course, considering that the total population of the West Coast of the United States is only 20% of that of the East Coast, the influence of Willie Brown, a black leader on the West Coast, is obviously incomparable to that of Martin Luther King - but it is enough for him to enter the political arena and "be recruited for murder and arson."

　In 1964, Willie Brown was elected to the California State Assembly and successfully sat in the state legislature in Sacramento, the capital of California, becoming one of only four black members of the entire state legislature. During this period, he shouted anti-war slogans every day, went against the White House, and sang against the president.

　This might seem outrageous in the East, but it's a common occurrence in Western politics.

　——As the anti-war movement in the United States gained momentum, a powerful anti-war faction soon emerged within the Democratic Party. Many flexible Democratic politicians cut ties with President Johnson and joined the anti-war movement in order to win votes and support.

　As the leader of the anti-war faction within the party, Democratic Senator Eugene McCarthy of Minnesota (not the far-right McCarthy who launched McCarthyism in the past, but a left-wing figure) was the most active and even wanted to replace Johnson and run in the next general election.

　Although FBI Director Hoover, under the White House's instructions, did everything he could to combat the anti-war movement, even the FBI couldn't directly confront senators, let alone stop American politicians' innate desire to canvass for votes. Unless one day the United States completely abolished its electoral system.

　Since the Democratic Party leaders in Washington were so rebellious, there were even more Democrats in the states who refused to obey President Johnson's baton. Willie Brown, a black man, was nothing if he mixed in and sang a dissenting tune.

　In the 1966 midterm elections, Willie Brown, who had gained popularity by "uniting the party and attacking the dissidents", confidently went against the tide and tried to run for a member of the House of Representatives, against the backdrop of the overall bleak situation of the Democratic Party.

　Moreover, relying on the solid vote bank of black supporters and the endorsement of many anti-war leaders in the party, Willy Brown's chances of success are really quite high!

　——Martin Luther King publicly endorsed him! And President Kennedy’s brother, Robert Kennedy, also announced his support for him!

　Meanwhile, Fieri's eldest brother, Bernard, has chosen the exact opposite of Willie Brown. For the past two years, he has been hesitant to fully oppose the White House. While he has criticized a number of foolish White House policies to appease voters, his criticisms have generally been general, falling into the category of "minor criticism, major support"... Fieri shook his head, unable to dissuade his self-righteous brother.

　Alas, my foolish brother, you are not a civil servant who is steady and stable, but a politician who relies on attracting attention and showing off!

　In the United States, for those who are not from prominent families and want to play politics, it is almost the same as engaging in pyramid schemes and fraud. "If you want to succeed, you must first go crazy" - if you are a grassroots congressman with no foundation and cannot often "make shocking remarks", who will support you?

　Well, there are probably only a bunch of fellow Irish people. But there really aren't enough Irish people in Los Angeles!