Join the new world

A couple of days ago, the United Netherlands voted on the new PEACE charter. This may not seem that special, but what many Dutch and Belgians were not aware of was that in private government forums it had in secret been discussed that if the charter would not be accepted, the UNL was to leave PEACE GC entirely. This was withheld from the public and caused fierce arguments and heated debates when word of it leaked through. The charter was ultimately rejected due to its imperialist nature, further escalating the issue.

Clashing Parties

The problem has inflated into a great mess in which the largest Dutch & Belgian political parties started fighting each other. The current government of the United Netherlands is formed by the Libertarian Social Democrats and the Belgian Party while a smaller force in the current administration but one of the eNetherlands' oldest and most active parties is Iron & Wine which vehemently opposes these events and wishes to stay within PEACE GC, rather trying to modify the charter than to simply leave the alliance.

The arguments are manifold. Most pro-PEACE voices argue that the UNL's continued membership of the alliance is important to its continued survival and defence due to their reliable and long-time allies as for example France, Germany, and UK, while the contra-PEACE faction reassures their people that they would already be in secret negotiations with other countries and that faith should be put in them for they would already be taking care of the matter and have secured new allies. In turn, PEACE supporters also raise the argument that it would be a very disloyal act to leave an alliance the country has been a member and part of for such a long time, just or especially now since it's in a crisis threatening its further existence.

The Effect on Belgium

These events might also critically affect the outcome of the Belgian elections and might prolong the occupation through the Romanians. Thus far, Iron & Wine has very actively supported the Belgian cause, and invested much gold in trying to subdue the resistance wars and transferred a lot of its members (including a sizeable number of important leaders) to Belgium to receive citizenship there in order to politically liberate it during these elections. Yet in the light of the domestic crisis in the UNL the party saw itself compelled to retract from Belgium assuming Dutch citizenship again to focus on the UNL's own elections. While some chose to stay in Belgium the outcome of this month's elections is highly insecure and it remains to be seen if the Belgians can win over the Romanians even without the support of I&W.

Further Reading:

* An article by an LSD congress member again summarising the situation.
* The resignation of the United Netherlands' Minister of Defence in response to these events.
* An Iron & Wine member returning from Belgium to run for congress.



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