The Anarchy

The Anarchy was a brief period tumultuous instability in the history of colonial Mars. This period was initiated by the gradual departure of the Imperial Armed Forces and the Imperial Martian Home Guard as the Empire fell into the Succession Crisis. Their departure created a power vacuum, transforming the formerly stable and prosperous colonies into a breeding ground for political chaos and criminal opportunity.

In the wake of the Imperial Armed Forces’ exit, the colony’s existing governmental structures began to crumble, setting the stage for a slow but dramatic shift in power dynamics. With no centralized force to maintain peace and order beyond the meagre native police forces at the disposal of individual colonial administrations, the colony quickly descended into lawlessness. The municipal governments, had deprived of their authority by writ of the Imperial Household, found itself ill-equipped to contain the rapidly escalating chaos.

The power vacuum was soon filled by numerous warlords and opportunistic criminal organizations. These factions, each vying for supremacy, effectively ran creating an alternate government beyond the control of the official colonial administration, creating their own rules and regulations. Their reign was characterized by arbitrary enforcement of laws, extortion, and widespread violence. Public safety plummeted as these competing factions fought brutal turf wars, with ordinary colonists caught in the crossfire.

As the devastating conditions during The Anarchy continued to worsen to a critical point, the remaining central authorities, witnessing the decimation of the society, took matters into their own hands. Shunning the remnants of the Empire’s influence, they banded together to form a self-governing body – an independent government that was truly sovereign unto itself.

This formation of the independent government marked a critical turning point in the history of the Martian colonies. This would ad hoc centralized colonial government would form the origins of both the Federal Union of Mars and the Free States of Mars, the two contemporary power blocs on Mars.