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Definitely i think rivers/waterways and farming land would be a bigger factor in how the lines were drawn up. Some regions are going to want to control water heavily, it's absolutely going to become a much bigger importance in a couple decades with how our climate is shifting. Right now the west cost is in a massive fucking drought and there is no way they could continue the way it is now without maintaining control of where their water comes from
From a simulation perspective, going down to county borders (Crusader Kings style) would probably be a feasible amount of granularity. Getting county maps and populations would be more time consuming than difficult, and county-level tax revenue figures might not be too much to add on top of this.
Yeah no way Missouri wouldn't split in half, they did during the civil war.
The theory that Texas gets bigger, rather than balkinizing until a dozen mini-Texi, is something only a person from outside of Texas would come up with.
I feel like New York, Texas, and California just kind of pulling states into their orbit is a lot more likely, with chaos in the details.
Finally, enough text to be the One True Leftist Meme.
Cool shit
The thing I've always pondered about this stuff is how extremely powerful regions that grow food and control water supply will be. They have the option of crippling other parts of the continent. So much stuff is grown in a tight but large area that I'd assume would then have to be heavily guarded and fortified? Assuming there is hostilities that will arise and tbh i don't think there would be a texas v california thing going, no idea how serious but texas fuckin HATES california and texas doesn't really grow food, using this map they would have good access to soy, wheat and other things, but their fruits and veg would mostly have to be imported from CA.
Ah, but Texas has that other necessary resource, energy. Can't grow food without it.
I love long Mexico in that alternate map. Like, yeah, fuck it, just gonna skirt by Texas here and keep conquering all the way to North Carolina hahaha
The border areas of Texas are already 85%+ Hispanic. Mexico's army wouldn't have much problem powering through all the way to Dallas. Sure there would be some rednecks with shotguns, but they'd melt away before regiments of soldiers with full auto FN-FALs. It's Mexico's territory anyway, it was stolen by white supremacists. It would be justice to see it returned with most of the infrastructure intact. Imagine what a boon it would be for Mexico. Then it could put up a wall to keep illegal white aliens out. Ho, ho, ho what a future.
You kidding? They're still mad. They hate Santa Anna because he was the source of all this shit. They'd like nothing more than to correct the record, and seize badly needed productive land while they're at it. Imagine Mexico dictating to the disunited states of America from a position of strength. They were teaching Aztlan ideology in Arizona schools not too long ago before the fascists found out and threw a hissy fit.
A couple other thoughts:
In a semi-hostile land grab, I think California stops at nothing to secure at least the western and northwestern parts of AZ to secure the Colorado River water. That would have to be strategic objective #1 by far and I would think the would throw everything they could toward their south/southeast, and ignore the the north. CA desperately needs that water and I can't imagine it would be all that important to the Texas metropole.
I don't understand the "Mexico gets involved scenario. Does this say they get OK and MO but not say TX, KS and AR? The Neutral Strip and the area around Joplin MO are huge chokepoints.
Huge amounts of territory were stolen from Mexico at gunpoint. Payback is a bitch.
I mean it's awesome, don't get me wrong. Just don't understand how it works.
Mexican Peacekeeping force keeping the Northerners and Southerners separate
I think that user meant, it's not intuitive to most US citizens that other countries in general would have formidable armies. Considering that Texas might have 1/5th of the US military, and probably some strong arsenals close enough to the area, and how strong is Mexico's army? Would a military enforced reverse-lebensraum against Texas be viable in Mexican politics?
It's modeled solely on population, national guard (or I assume whole military for Mexico) size, and tax revenue, so it's going to give some funky borders where Mexico eats up whatever small states it can.
I know this is using current state borders but eastern Oregon and Washington would 100% be part of Idaho
East Oregon and Washington join Idaho, and the West joins Canada, probably
That depends on how much of Idaho breaks off to join the new theocracy in Utah
Michigan would probably split between the upper peninsula and the mitten
Good stuff. I really like how you I think correctly treat the Rockies - that in a lot of ways they're almost like an ocean that separates the country. SLC has much deeper ties to Vegas and Phoenix than Denver but fake maps really like to mash Utah and Colorado together.
Really only disagree with Illinois. Chicagoans would sooner be subsumed by Lake Michigan than be associated with "the south". And rural Illinois has pretty deep cultural, social, and economic ties to Wisconsin, Indiana, Ohio, and Iowa. I can really only seem them being yellow or pink.
This is really cool, but I feel like its missing the ability for a state to break up. As messed up as representative districts are, it may be worth trying those, or counties.
Probably natural borders and strategic objectives would make the most sense. Like the borders should probably be rivers/mountain ranges etc, unless there's something a region desperately needs (e.g. California and a reliable water supply).
Maybe population density can be used as a rough measurement of natural borders, so that taking over a statelet with a low population density is harder than taking one with a high?
Many people may move during a balkanization, so that could end up throwing numbers off.
I think plenty of states would break up. It's hard to say which, but I think Eastern Oregon, North/South Florida, or parts of California/Nevada could.
A few regions would surely break away, like the Upper Peninsula (Michigan) or the Delmarva Peninsula/Eastern Shore (mostly Maryland, partly Virginia).
Those regions are landmasses are separated by water from the rest of the state and wouldn't necessarily be part of the same country in a balkanized US.
Mountainous areas would definitely define major fault lines as highways are blown and armored vehicles consolidate land otherwise. Major rivers have generally already done that with state lines but would probably increase the squiggles somewhat.
I think its also worth mentioning that existing infrastructure may bring certain cities together, given that it isn't decimated. Its especially important to note in regions which lack certain natural resources and rely on imports.
Yeah does the world really need more Texans? There are already too many
As other people are saying, Texas would likely be broken up. The regions of Texas (in most cases) share more in common with neighboring states than with other parts of Texas. El Paso and San Antonio (maybe Austin?) would likely go towards the Southwest states. North Texas would go towards Oklahoma/Nebraska/Kansas. East Texas would join up with the Southern states.
I think the idea implicit in this map is that it's very much based in the material conditions following a collapse rather than ideology, which I love. Like, the different parts of Texas might have different cultures but if the federal government and national economy collapse, people aren't going to care as much about making sure their new country is ideologically coherent so much as being able to secure resources and security. And the largest, most powerful states now will be set up the best to provide that. Big fish eats little fish. That's why in this scenario I don't think far north California tries to break away, for example. Because being a part of "California" would probably offer folks up there most security as well as maintaining an economy that would most closely match the level of the former US more than maybe anywhere. That's incentive enough for the reactionaries up there to hold their nose and take orders from Sacramento.
