Aurora:Armenia
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Armenia, officially the First Republic of Armenia, was an Unitary Presidential Republic in the South Caucasus. It bordered Turkey to the west, Georgia and Phoenicia to the Northwest, Israel to the South and Southeast, and Kushan/Persia to the East. The capital of Armenia was at first Shushi and later Yerevan, while the oldest city was Stepanakert. The largest city by population is Abraq, acquired during the collapse of the Crusader States. Armenia at it's peak had 10 towns, 7 being in the Armenian homeland, while the other 3 were considered colonies. The people of Armenia elected a new government every 2 months, with the President and National Assembly being up for election. Armenia was active in regional and global politics, as a member of the Levantine Pact and the Organization of Free Nations.
History
Pre-History
Before the current Armenian towns were founded, the South Caucasus was sparsely populated. The region was mainly settled by Turks who may or may not have actually been affiliated with Turkey, and by colonies of Khazar. Three important ancient towns that have since fallen into ruin were Kars, lead by Turks, which was built atop an even more ancient settlement about which little to no information is known, Yerevan, also run by Turks, and Bunditown, which was lead by a Khazar citizen who the town is named after. All three towns were long gone by the time the Armenians arrived at the region, but there are many ruins still left by those towns which have been largely preserved by the Armenian settlers. The ruins of Kars are now owned by the Armenian town of Alexandropol, while the ruins of Bunditown make up very important parts of the Armenian capital, Shushi. The ruins of Yerevan were demolished by Turkey when the new town going by the same name was created. In New Orthinian tradition, the ruins which predated Kars are the legendary city of Old Orthinia, the fabled homeland of the Orthinians.
Creation of Yerevan and first conflict with Turkey
The idea of Armenia began in January of 2023, when lovelyfurball and lumberjackie25, who knew each other in real life, decided that it would be a fun idea to make Armenia in the server. While they were still ordinary citizens in Laccadive Sea, lumberjackie saw someone with the username Armenianrus in the tab list. He messaged him asking if he would like to help form Armenia, and Armenianrus agreed. On January 13 the discord server for Armenia was created, with a few friends joining. Together, they founded the town of Yerevan on the ruins of the old Turkish town of the same name. However, the Armenians realized that their town was in the Turkish claim map, and decided to open a ticket in the Turkish discord to ask for some land. However, negotiations went sour after Lumberjackie25's aggressive negotiation tactics met with the Turks dislike for Armenia, and war was close to beginning. However, lovelyfurball then entered the negotiations, and he saw that the only feasible way for tiny Armenia to survive was to leave Turkish claims. He agreed to delete Yerevan in exchange for 100 gold.
Formation of the first Armenian towns
From there, Armenianrus and ironswordaiden9 moved East and created the town of Stepanakert using the gold that Turkey had given them. They expanded this town, and the other Armenians soon moved in. Wanting a second Armenian town, lovelyfurball left Stepanakert and went further east to form Shushi. Lumberjackie25 would move to Shushi with him, and the 2 towns would develop side by side. In this time, Armenia first began to talk with other nations. The nation with the most interest in Armenia was Kurdistan, who was also at war with Turkey and saw Armenia as a potential ally. The Armenian towns would attempt to temporarily join Kurdistan, but when they realized that the nation of Kurdistan was closed, they decided to instead join Phoenicia. Phoenicia was a close ally to Kurdistan, and the leader of Phoenicia, Ave2k, would quickly become friends with the Armenians, particularly Lumberjackie25. Armenianrus, who had left the Soviet Union to help create Armenia, helped Armenia gain connections to the Soviet Union. Armenianrus would even petition the other Armenians to have Armenia because an SSR within the Soviet Union, but the others refused, wishing Armenia to be independent. Armenianrus also had connections to Bulgaria, which would reach out to the Armenians. There were also talks with Silesia, but Silesia quickly lost interest in Armenia.
Another problem the Armenians had to worry about was Azerbaijan, which was in a similar situation to Armenia (without a nation and with only 2 towns). Azerbaijan was initially thought to be a potential friend to Armenia, as both fledgling nations had connections to the Soviet Union. However, relations quickly turned sour after Gamerwolf6838 demanded that Shushi join Azerbaijan instead of Armenia, as it was in real-life Azeri territory. The Armenians rejected this, and when Azerbaijan made the town of Karabakh right outside of Stepanakert, war began between the 2 brand new nations.
War with Azerbaijan
The war with Azerbaijan quickly began to consume all of the attention and time of the Armenians. Seeing the Azerbaijani town of Ganja expand towards Stepanakert, the Armenians began to spend a lot of time mining in order to expand their towns and prevent Azerbaijan from taking all their land. The claim war between Azerbaijan and Armenia would be very costly for both sides as it sucked in massive amounts of Gold which could have been used for creating the Nation or developing the towns.
To make matters even worse, out of nowhere, a town was created on the ruins of Armenian Yerevan. This town was called Sevan(Armenia), and had the intention to create Armenia as well. They were completely unrelated to the Armenians in Stepanakert and Shushi, and they would cause much confusion in Turkey and Phoenicia as people struggled to figure out who was who. Sevan would wage war against Turkey, hunting Turkish citizens, which enraged the Turks who assumed the Armenians in Stepanakert and Shushi had something to do with it. The terrified Armenians would attempt to explain the situation as best they understood, as this came as a surprise to them as well. Thankfully, within a couple weeks, the mayor of Sevan realized that the Armenians in Stepanakert and Shushi were more determined to create Armenia and were better fit to own the town, and he sold Sevan to Armenia. Armenianrus would leave Stepanakert to become the new mayor of Sevan. Even though it was in Turkish claims, the Turks would allow the Armenians to control the town because they were thankful that they had made the hostile mayor of Sevan leave the region.
The claim war with Azerbaijan would continue as Shushi attempted to claim the ruins of Bunditown and not allow Baku to have them, while Stepanakert and Sevan would desperately attempt to connect their claims to stop Ganja from cutting Armenia in half. However, the Armenians would make a blunder as some of the new claims of Shushi and Stepanakert would be deleted by moderators for being claimarms. In the end, the Armenians would get these deleted claims back by reclaiming them in a more solid way. Eventually the claim war would stabilize somewhat. The conflict began to slow down with occasional new towns being created by both sides. Over the course of 3 months Azerbaijan would create 4 towns below Stepanakert. Azerbaijan making towns by Stepanakert would become a meme among the Armenians, as they never actually had any intention of claiming that area. Armenia would fire back by creating 2 towns to the North and East of Ganja, called Musclemen and Alexandropol. Later, Musclemen would fall it's ruins would be claimed by Alexandropol. The claim war was the most important part of the Armenia-Azerbaijan war, but there would also be some PVP involved. Over the course of the war there would be 5 Armenian casualties and 1 Azerbaijani casualty, thanks to skilled Turkish volunteers assisting the Azeris.
Expansion and Nationhood
Armenia would continue to grow in population and create new towns even though they still hadn't made an actual nation. The towns of Alexandropol and Musclemen would be created, while the town of Shiraz in Iran would be bought from the former mayor of Sevan. By the time the in-game nation was founded, Armenia already had 6 towns within it. Lovelyfurball would begin grinding in order to form the in-game nation in April. Also in April, Armenia became large enough for the first Armenian elections to be held. All residents of Armenian towns as well as foreigners who requested dual citizenship would be allowed to vote. Lovelyfurball would be elected President, while Armenianrus, Ave2k, and Not_moyboy would be elected to the National Assembly. The elections signified a new era for Armenia, and thanks in part to a donation by Cascadia, the in-game nation would be founded on April 30th, 2023. Almost immediately after the nation was founded, Armenia would join the Levantine Pact with it's longtime allies Phoenicia and Kurdistan, as well as Israel and Egypt, and also joined the Organization of Free Nations with Cascadia, the North Sea Republic, and the Midwest Union. Soon after the nation was created, the war with Azerbaijan would officially end as the Azerbaijani leader would sell Ganja, capital of Azerbaijan, to Turkey. In the months following this most other Azerbaijani towns would fall into ruin. Another Armenian town would also be created in this time, with Martuni being founded.
First Presidency of Lovelyfurball
After being founded Armenia entered a period of fast expansion. During his tenure as President, the number of towns in Armenia went from 6 to 10, and the population of Shushi ballooned from 12 to 20. The Constitution of Armenia would be ratified, as well as the Law book. Armenia further integrated into the region, developing closer ties with Phoenicia (now known in-game as Syria) and Israel. However, Armenia would lose touch with Bulgaria, and the Soviet Union would collapse. Armenia would also join Kings League during this time, which was a football league. Football would go on to become massive in Armenia, with almost every Armenian joining AFC Armenia in Kings League, and a massive stadium being constructed in the capital.
Crusader States Crisis
In late June, a middle eastern Christian nation known as the Crusader States would begin to collapse after the king of Crusader States, WakePVP, would quit the server. His appointed successor, Emulationnerd, would betray a promise he made to WakePVP not to join any meganation and join Persia. Many in Crusader States were outraged at the betrayal by the new king and wished to leave Crusader States. Armenia would position itself as a home for refugees fleeing the collapsing nation. 2 towns from Crusader States would join Armenia, ballooning its population. Meanwhile, Crusader States continued to further collapse with many towns leaving to join various nations, and eventually, Crusader States was renamed and ceased to exist in the eyes of many.
June General Elections
On June 19th of 2023, the June 2023 Armenian General Elections were announced. 6 Presidential candidates registered to run, but one was disqualified by the electoral commission. This election was marred by issues, such as many foreigners without citizenship registering to vote through a loophole in the constitution. The election also took a lot longer than expected due to the electoral commission taking awhile to create the form, choosing for the voting period to be extra long, and taking a long time to compile the results. Of the 5 registered parties, 3 would be considered major parties, with the incumbent Development Party competing with it's old opposition The Federalist Party, and a new populist party, the Centralist Armenia Party. The Presidential vote went into a runoff between the Development Party candidate, incumbent President lovelyfurball, and the CAP candidate, Representative Ave2k. Lovelyfurball would win the runoff, however, the Development Party lost its majority in the National Assembly with the seats being split evenly between the 3 parties.
Second Presidency of Lovelyfurball
In late June of 2023, lovelyfurball was elected for a second term as President in a tight race with Ave2k, as well as other minor candidates. His party also retained a majority in the National Assembly. However, the war with Persia would end in disaster during this term, with Persia sniping the town of Sevan and occupying Martuni. These defeats lead to lovelyfurball resigning in disgrace, with Armenia quickly collapsing. The nation of Armenia would be given to MrX1208 and renamed to Caspian , and most Armenian towns would fall. As of February 2024, two Armenian towns remain, Shushi and Alexandropol. Neither of these towns have remained in Caspian. Lovelyfurball briefly returned to Armenia and refounded the town of Stepanakert, but left after being offered the nation of Israel. Shushi and Alexandropol remained under the influence of Israel, but have since left the nation after quarox777 acquired the nation, Shushi joining Turkey and Alexandropol joining Caspian.
Government
The Constitution of Armenia is designed to forge a Democratic and efficient government. The Constitution established that the President, who is King in-game, and a legislature called the National Assembly, would be elected every 2 months by the Armenian citizens. Armenia would be centralized under it's elected government, and towns within Armenia would not be given autonomy. Everyone who was either a resident of an Armenian town or a foreigner who had been approved for Dual Citizenship could vote in elections. The National Assembly would be tasked with passing laws and funding certain projects using the National Treasury. The President and his Cabinet would be tasked with running the day-to-day functions of the Nation, carrying out laws passed by the National Assembly, and running the foreign affairs of the nation.