Stormclouds gather overhead, enveloping the barren, hot salt flats, abandoned prefab-assembly cities and small nomadic communities of the Caspian Plateau in darkness.
It has been almost 50 years since the USSR's dissolution, with Khruschev's attempts at saving it having been washed away by the red tide of the 1991 August Coup. With the hardliners at last in charge, the USSR's chaotic and slow dissolution turned into a catastrophically violent, blood-soaked one. The new regime, completely unwilling to allow the dissolution of their socialist union, embroiled it's holdings in conflict. One such holding, of course, was Central Asia. Defeated in Afghanistan, and with the spread of radical islam digging it's clutches as deep as Kazakhstan, the bitter and dying USSR gathered all of it's remaining strength for one purpose: to prevent the region from prospering in their abscence. A drainage canal, dubbed the Volga-Ural Canal, was dug between the two rivers, flooding the steppe and preventing flow of water into the Caspian, evaporating it with the wind, rendering the region nearly uninhabitable.
The year, is 2025. Khruschovskaya Oblast, a small area that was once the centre of the Caspian Sea, stands tall as a brutal reminder of ages past with it's Caspian Lake. The only remaining member state of the USSR, the Russian Soviet Socialist Republic, rests tired and defeated to the north. In the centre, a fragile UN administration fails to keep the peace, allowing the plateau to descend into perhaps the most lucrative crime triangle on Earth. In the south, rests new, radicalised enemies, fighting not just the locals, but also amidst one another for control over the vital river delta, perfect grounds for growing opium away from any prying government's eyes.
Where do you belong in this conundrum? Join, and find out your destiny in the Caspian Redoubt.
