Two Russias

For 22 years, the civil war has raged. Moscow is a husk of a city, burned to the ground by the Tsar to force the Bolsheviks out. Both sides practice scorched-earth tactics to deny their enemy any advantage. Millions have died in the fighting, while millions more have starved. Russia has managed to snatch obscurity from the jaws of Empire, becoming nothing more than pawns in the greater game of more stable empires.

The countryside is a patchwork of hardscrabble peasants, ruined towns and destroyed infrastructure all lorded over by military warlords. Russia is a land where the line between survival and starvation is how well you can hide your supplies from the next sweep by the local warlord.

St. Petersburg is a city of vast contrasts. From the pristine grandeur of the Imperial Palace to the filth and grime of the massive factory district, St. Petersburg is a city like few in the world. It is at once, a functioning cultural and royal center and also a war machine in constant production.

Kiev on the other hand, is a sprawling, banal and regimented city. It was razed in 1925, by the Communists and then rebuilt for functionality and efficiency. Factories here churn out tanks and planes and weapons at all hours of the night, but crushed among the machines is the soul of a people.

The Russian Far East has fallen on hard times, utterly ignored by both sides. The Trans-Siberian Railroad has long fallen in to disrepair and is now impassable, while Korea gobbles up what it can.
