Great War III

Alternative Names
At the time of the conflict dozens of potential names were proposed. The most popular among them included The AfGATOstan War and March Madness. None of the alternate names stuck, however, and today the war is universally referred to simply as Great War Three, or some variation thereof.

Casus Belli
Not long after the St. Patrick's Day War began, NPO claimed that GATO was spying on them as well as harboring intentions of hostility, as revealed by several leaked chat conversations between GATO's Assembly Chairman, Vincent Xander, and Legion's Foreign Minister, Sir Galahad. NPO also discovered and banned a spy from GATO on their forums.

Events of the War
Following the NPO/GATO dispute, on March 19th, a post was made on the CN forums containing a leaked forum screenshot from mpol (leader of FAN) discussing an upcoming attack on GATO. The content was later identified as coming from a private Initiative leadership forum. The post outlined an upcoming attack by NPO, MDC, GGA and \m/ against GATO to be made that night at 15min before reset. Additionally, it laid out the Initiatives plans to deal with other alliances coming to the defense of GATO. Specifically, it allocated NpO and an unidentified party to counter NAAC while FAN and TOP were to counter any intervention from The Legion and instructed the GOONS to counter ODN.

The NPO made the first move by declaring war on GATO at 10:45pm on March 19th. This DoW was followed only a few minutes later by \m/, GGA and MDC with declarations of support from fellow Initiative members: FAN, VE, TOP, CIS and NoR. Before the end of March 19th, the largest members of The Initiative had rallied support against GATO. .

However, on March 20, shortly before update, Ivan Moldavi posted a controversial statement praising The Legion on behalf of the NPO and officially reactivating their MDP with Legion, 'The Imperial Accords'. The statement could have meant many different things, but The Legion interpreted it as goading them, and would eventually activate their MDP with GATO. Later that night, at 10:47pm Genmay and the GOONS activated their MDP and declared war on GATO.

On the morning of March 21st, at 1:16am, WAPA became the first alliance to join sides with GATO, approximately 27 hours since NPO had issued the first Declaration of War on GATO. . At 8:54 PM on March 21st, 2007, the NAAC became the second power to enter on the side of GATO followed shortly by the IAA who declared war on GGA of the Initiative. Legion's announced it position at 9:07 PM when VL Empire, Prime Minister of the The Legion, declared war on The Initiative. But Legion attacks on FAN, TOP and GGA had begun almost 10 minutes earlier at 9:00 PM thus breaking their NAP treaties with FAN and TOP. Both FAN and TOP claimed suprise since it was the NPO who had attacked GATO and both FAN and TOP did not consider themselves to be in a state of war with GATO and so questioned the NAAC and Legion's so called "defense" of GATO by attacking uninvolved alliances. Less than an hour later, the Global Democratic Alliance activated their MDP with the NPO declaring war on the Legion and other alliances attacking the New Pacific Order.

Less than an hour after update on the 22nd, b|/b/, an alliance that had long been neutral in similar conflicts, declared war on the VE and other select alliances of The Initiative. The VE was outraged at /b/'s declaration and declared that they would never declare peace with /b/. This declaration caused Archon's DramaNations meter to go from Red (at which it had been for two days) to Black.

Later that day, alliances of the Sphere power block issued declarations of war. The first to do so was the BTA, citing a defense clause in a PIAT as their justification for war. The BTA focused their attacked on the CIS. 5 more alliances declared war on the CIS on the same day, citing activation of their MADP with BTA. On the 3/29/07, the Sphere alliances EoTS, GoG, RnR, MCB, and MRA surrendered to the CIS. Their surrenders effectively dissolved the Sphere MADP bloc.

LUE, at 8:58 PM, officially renounced the terms of surrender to The Initiative from the aftermath of The Second Great War, activating their pre-GWII MADP with GATO and declaring war on Gen[M]ay. 

At 10:31, ODN and CDS jointly declared war on the GOONS. GOONS returned the declaration a few minutes later. About an hour later, Farkistan entered the war on GATO's side. 

On March 23rd, the Mostly Harmless Alliance joined the global war by declaring on the Legion several hours prior to update, citing their MDP with the New Pacific Order. (Source: MHA DoW)

Many have drawn comparisons between this war and GW2 (FARK War). The lack of sanctioned nuclear attacks and the involvement of almost equally matched power blocs are the more notable similarities.

On March 24th, with the war raging, the GOONS activated their MADP with TotalFarkistan. TF! declared war on TotalGenmay, a joke alliance created by LUE.

On 3/24-3/25 several smaller alliances responded to Legion and other GATO-aligned calls to join the good fight and declared on Initiative forces. Their total Nation Strength added little to the overall fight and only temporarily masked both GATO and Legion's steepening declines in total Nation Strength. These alliances were condemned as 'Bandwagoners' by the Initiative forces and were dealt with as such.

On 4/4/07, Ivan Moldavi made a public statement saying that NAAC had an information leak and that he had been informed that NAAC was planning to authorize nuclear attacks against Initiative targets. . His claims for this were that a member of NAAC had sent him screenshots from their forums which showed the current protector, AlmightyGrub, wanted to "go out with a bang," as well as a regular member saying that he was going to use his nukes. On top of that, it appeared that St Heliers, a powerful member of the NAAC and member of the Blue Senate, had posted as a diplomat in the NpO forums stating that NAAC planned to go fully nuclear at update.

However, in that thread, AlmightyGrub clarified that the NAAC had no intentions to declare nuclear war. Virilus, the Minister of Defense, and numerous other NAAC members and even ex-NAAC members said that not only was this not true, but St Heliers was not even a diplomat to the NpO. St Heliers later confirmed that he did not even have an account on the NpO forums, and that someone must have made an account under his name.

CDS Prime Minister Seleucus Ontuas later made the declaration of all out nuclear war on GOONS due to the fact that GOONS was not allowing the CDS to surrender. Realizing that this would mean the complete and utter destruction of CDS, former CDS members including former leader filipinoboi122 staged a coup deposing the government. The new government officially signed a surrender document and the war between CDS and GOONS was declared to be over.

Dark Friday
Two b|/b/ rogues launched nuclear weapons despite the universal agreement not to go nuclear. Unable to control her members as many more were following suit and beginning to spam the CN forums, Furseiseki disbanded b|/b/ in order to protect the members who still wished to play from becoming outcasts.

With the disbandment, more prominent members of the b|/b/ alliance to include their emperor, began "/b/ombing" the forums with obscene images, as was the tradition of 4chan.org raids: child pornography, goatse, mutilated animals, and human torture, just to name a few. The moderators acted swiftly to try and erase these images, but they were not swift enough. With every IP ban another /b/tard, using an anonymous proxy would take its place and continue the attack. Shortly following this incident, NAAC announced that in their disgust, they were ordering all their nations to stand down. The Old Guard also followed suit. LOSS did the same, and surrendered that week.

Shortly following the incident massive DDoS attacks on the site by /b/ which in turned had to close the main site down. the Admin implemented the "Confusion of Babylon" and closed down the Open World Forums -, the entire forum soon followed.

Thus with the forums and main site down, and the Month of March making way for April, March Madness ended with the very existence of CN teetered on the brink. And still the war raged well into the month of April.

Independent and Neutral Alliances
This third Great War of CyberNations was by far the largest yet in CN history, involving more alliances and certainly more nations than ever before. Many formerly "neutral" or "independent" alliances joined the war on either side. The nature of this conflict sparked discussion of entering the war in nearly every alliance across CN. Some notable members of neutral/independent alliances have even taken a temporary leave of absence to fight alongside friends, whether they know them in person or through CN, or even just to fight for whichever cause they believe to be just.

The two largest Neutral Powers in GW3 were the Green Protection Agency (GPA) (see the Declaration of Neutrality) and Independent Republic of Orange Nations (IRON). Both these sanctioned alliances were pressured to join, and either could have given a side a numerical, NS, and/or morale advantage. Both IRON and GPA have long term relations with alliances on both sides.

The GPA issued statements that are holding to their neutrality, and any deviation from this neutrality would fundamentally alter the basis of the alliance. []

The Independent IRON decided protection of their members required that they stay neutral in the conflict. Since IRON's bylaws did not forbid an aggressive war, IRON was under considerably MORE pressure to enter the conflict than the GPA.

The neutral alliance ONOS became sanctioned in the aftermath of GW3. They and their neutral allies in GUARD, were also pressured into joining the war. They remained neutral through the conflict.

Other Events

 * 3/21 - FAN announces its "X Nuclear Rogue" Policy.
 * 3/29 - Legion member Cricket of Rlyeh uses his deceased friend's nation to aid fellow Legionnaires. It is attacked and he begs the attackers on the CN forums to spare it.
 * 3/30 - "Black Friday" -Various former b|/b/ members attack CN Forums by posting various shock images or other spam. Various DOS attacks are also carried out on CyberNations and the source code was stolen.
 * 3/30 - CN Forums brought down from 1pm 3/30 to 8am 4/2
 * 3/31 - Cyber Nations momentarily shut down
 * 4/2 - Forums brought back online as of 8:00AM, game itself remains off-line
 * 4/2 - Admin responds to question about Game Time during the temporary shutdown of Cyber Nations with: "Time will continue on and when the game resumes you will collect taxes on all the days that the game was offline. There will be no inactivity deletions due to the downtime. If the game is down for 5 days I will put the cleanup schedule on hold for 5 days to allow everyone time to access their nations."
 * 4/3 - Cyber Nations comes back online.
 * 4/9 - A coup occurs within CDS and the new government immediately surrenders to GOONS.
 * 4/10 - VE withdraws from The Initiative, but continues to attack nations holding the b|/b/ alliance affiliation.
 * 4/11 - NAAC rejects surrender terms given to them.
 * 4/11 - NAAC terminates MDP with GATO

Surrenders and Withdrawals
Part I, March Madness Surrenders

3/26 - APIN has an coup d'etat and surrender to GGA

3/30 - Furseiseki disbands b|/b/.

3/30 - The Sphere alliances surrender to CIS.

3/30-3/31 - Old Guard announces their surrender with intentions to pay forty five million to FAN and TOP.

3/30-3/31 - RIA and MDC cease-fire. RIA agrees to pay sixty million in reparations to the MDC and replace their maroon team senator due to the sanctions imposed on MDC members at the beginning of the war.

Part II, April Finale Surrenders

4/4 - LoSS officially surrenders to the Viridian Entente under the terms of downgrading their current MDP's to PIATS and an alliance wide move to the pink sphere.

5th April- ASC surrenders to the MCCF

6th April- ODN surrenders to GOONS under the following terms.

6th April- LUEnited Nations disbands.

9th April- Prime Minister of the Coalition of Defensive States, Seleucus Ontuas, declares nuclear war on GOONS. CDS members stage a coup d'etat in response. CDS establishes a new government and surrenders to The Initiative.

9th April- Powerful Alliance of Green Nations banks collapse and President Chris resigns from PAGN. RulerEthan disbands PAGN which officially made a peace between the former nations of PAGN and GATO. It should be noted that if this alliance is ever reformed, then they would be in an active state of war with GATO.

10th April- The Legion surrenders to The Initiative. (Legion's Surrender Terms)

11th April - The Mostly Harmless Alliance officially recognizes The Legion's surrender and announces a cessation of hostilities.

11th April- Global Alliance and Treaty Organization surrenders to The Initiative

14th April- National Alliance for Arctic Countries disbands

14th April- GWIII officially declared over

Global Shift of Power
''**Legend: Black-Neutral, Blue-The Initiative & Allies, Red-Aegis(Ex-League & Allies)

Aftermath
Sanctioned Alliance Audit:

After the war, the admin team performed an Alliance Audit.


 * GATO lost sanctioned status.
 * NAAC lost sanctioned status. (for the second time.)
 * ONOS was sanctioned. (Making it the first of the maroon color sphere alliances to receive Sanctioned Status)
 * GOLD was sanctioned.

Alliances disbanded During or Due to the war:
 * b|/b/
 * LUEnited Nations
 * ~Dies~Irae~
 * Socialist Workers Front
 * Syndicate
 * National Alliance for Arctic Countries
 * Powerful Alliance of Green Nations
 * Blue Turtle Alliance (reformed into The Aquatic Brotherhood)

The CDS was also couped and replaced with ex-CDS leadership(including former members of NPO and LUE after their Prime Minister Seleucus Ontuas had declared nuclear war on GOONS.

Many people had lost respect for the Legion who, up until the war, had been the second strongest alliance in the Cyberverse.