2022 Excelsioran Coup d'état Attempt
| 2022 Excelsioran Coup d'état Attempt | |||
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| "The Winter Coup" | |||
| Date | January 1, 2022 - January 8, 2022 | ||
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| Goals | Overthrow of President Silas W., Installment of Lola G. as Federal President, replacement of the Government of Excelsior | ||
| Methods | Email and Discord threats, Money Transfers | ||
| Status | failed | ||
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| Lead figures | |||
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| Number | |||
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| Casualties and losses | |||
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The 2022 Excelsioran coup d'état, also known as the Winter Coup, was failed coup d'état launched on 7 January 2022 in Excelsior, via an email threat to Excelsioran President Silas W. After the email threat was launched, a task force was assembled, consisting of National security Advisor Nicolas Caiazzo, Commander-General Silas W., Bureau of Intelligence and Cybersecurity Commander Felix R.C., and BIC Operative Micah W. to determine who was behind the malicious emails and coup attempt. After the military threat level was raised to Threat Level 2, the National Military was mobilized and a state of emergency was declared. After an investigation in which a text chain between members of the group attempting the coup, the "Flower arrangers", was revealed, the military began arresting those involved in the coup. After a landmark Supreme Court case, Felix R.C., Lola G., Alice C., and Jasper S. were all charged with Class B Felonies in the Supreme Court, by acting Chief Justice Micah W. The coup greatly affected the Excelsioran political structure and resulted in a large Senate gain for the ruling Democratic Party of Excelsior.
Background
Before the original plotting of the coup, Felix R.C., one of the main conspirators involved, was a "rising politician in Excelsior", according to the ENNC, trusted by most of the populace. After bringing the Communist Party to major status, he helped with the merger of the Worker's Party and was appointed Reserve Minister, Senator, and Governor of the State of Dave, as well as Commander of the Bureau for Intelligence and Cybersecurity. One of the most active citizens, Felix had "immense"[1] power within the nation thanks to his close bonds with many powerful figures, including Chancellor Nicolas Caiazzo due to their close political ideologies. It was rumored by some, most notably Nicolas Caiazzo, that Felix would be the successor to Ben O.S. as Governor-General. Lola G., the main leader of the coup, was a "Democratic Party elite" politician and served as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. A fierce ally of the President, Silas W., she served in many important military positions and was described as a "bastion of the Democratic Party" by Nicolas Caiazzo. Silas and Lola also shared a joint bank account. Due to the high-level position of both Felix and Lola, they were not seen as threats to the government in any way by the Military, with both being Military Major Generals. The reaction from the public was surprised when they were informed the two were behind the coup.
Buildup
At an unknown date, supposed in early January, Lola G. contacted Felix trying to "overthrow Nico", Nico being Nicolas Caiazzo, the Chancellor of Excelsior. At the start of the planning, Lola said she didn't want to "wreck Silas too much", mostly because of their close personal friendship, which may possibly be the reason why the plan did not originally focus on deposing Silas, and only evolved to that in later-stage planning. After Felix agreed immediately, citing his experience as BIC Commander, the plan was officially launched. Originally, their plan was to depose Nicolas Caiazzo and install Lola G. As Chancellor. After Felix raised concerns about the nation collapsing without the "Effort Nico puts in", the plan was changed to keep him in power, instead seeking the presidency. The group, which they named the Flower Arrangers, a joke about the Power Rangers, planned to cause enough chaos to force President Silas W. into rescheduling the 2022 Presidential election months earlier than the original date. They would secretly support Micah W., the front line anti-Silas candidate, without him knowing. Once he was elected, they planned for "Silas [to be so] desperate for power that he [would] join [them]". Micah had just asked Felix to be his Vice-President, which strengthened the plan by giving the group control of the campaign. Their plan was to have top officials endorse Micah so Micah would win, a plan that was flawed due to the fact polls showed it would have made little difference. Once Micah was elected, they would depose him, betray Silas, and install Lola as President. After giving all power to Lola, they would keep Nico to do all the manual labor. Micah, Silas, and Nico, however, were never involved or compliant with the plan, leading to problems with the plan that developed late-stage in the coup, due to it resting so heavily on them. After Jasper S., the former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court who had recently fled to the Nation of granola and helped them fight Excelsior in the War of Resentment due to resentment he felt towards Silas and Nico for "making" him agree to allow elections for Supreme Court, which resulted in him losing his position, joined the group, as well as citizen of Excelsior Alice C., the plan was officially launched.
Money transfer and debt ransom plan
After about a day of planning, the Flower Arrangers supposedly finalized their plan and shared it with the rest of the members. They planned to transfer money from Silas and Lola's joint account to a separate, new bank account. To do this, however, they would need authorization from ExcelsiorBank, a branch of the Treasury Ministry. Their plan, as expressed in screenshots of a conversation between Felix and Lola, was to contact President Silas and trick him into giving them contact information for every citizen. They would then swindle those citizens out of their money, creating a massive debt most of the nation held to them. They would hold the nation at ransom to create chaos. Finally, they would contact people pretending to be the Government of Excelsior requesting they put Excels into a new Government fund. At this point they believed they would have control over most of the currency and could instate their main political plan, and then take over the nation.
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The original debt and ransom plan.
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The original debt and ransom plan.
Malicious text messages and threats
In early January, citizens of many citizens of Excelsior, most residing in the State of Invictus, received treats via SMS text messages. The messages were "verbal threats" against the "government of excelsior, particularly its president". They were all sent before the Government discovered the coup, and were cast away as a minor threat by the Government and Military. It was later revealed through BIC intelligence that the messages were sent by Felix R.C. and Lola G., the main conspirators of the coup.
Discovery of the coup
On January 7, 2022, President Silas W. received an email on his school email account, with the subject "Excelsior micro nation". The email was a threat to the Government of Excelsior, claiming that a secretive group had been monitoring Excelsior and were going to attempt to "Take it down". They threatened to attack Excelsior's currency, which was part of the later revealed debt and ransom plan, and warned the Government not to try and stop them. The email ended with a warning claiming the group would "not stop until the flag of Excelsior burns in the fireplace of hell". The email was signed "Willow Coppola, MAMG", and then email address was "Deathtoexcelsiornow@gmail.com". Upon reading the email, President Silas W. forwarded it to Nicolas Caiazzo, the Chancellor and National Security Advisor, but made no efforts to further contact Caiazzo. On January 8, 2022, Chancellor Caiazzo discovered the email and contacted Silas. After brief investigation of the email, Caiazzo announced to the public that they had received a "possible threat to national security", which they were currently assessing. He also declared a state of emergency and raised the Military Threat Level to TL-3. Immediately, the Bureau of Intelligence and Cybersecurity, led by Felix R.C., himself a member of the coup, was notified, and a task force was assembled.
Response
After announcing a minor threat to the public and informing the BIC, Nicolas Caiazzo informed Gaplan President Wyatt Baek of the threat and asked him to have the Intelligence Agency of the Gaplan Federation, or IAGF, to assist in finding the group behind the coup. President Silas then issued a statement to the public on behalf of the military warning those behind the coup that the Military would stand against the threat. The Government also released a status update. The announcements were broadcast to multiple nations through the Excelsioran National News Channel, or ENNC, through Discord.
Military and BIC action
A task force consisting of Commander-General Silas W., National Security Advisor Nicolas Caiazzo, BIC Branch Leader Felix R.C., who himself, while unknown to the Government at the time, was a member of the coup plot, and Operative Micah W. was assembled after the announcements. After running an IP tracer, the BIC determined that the IP used to send the email was from Mountain View, California, leading the BIC to suspect that Gaplan Citizens, many of whom live in California, were responsible. At the time of the coup, Excelsioran-Gaplan relations were the "most tense since the Gapla Crisis", according to Security Advisor Nicolas Caiazzo, so many suspect Anti-Excelsioran Gaplan citizens were likely responsible. The IAGF in Gapla was quickly notified about the possibility of the group being of Gaplan origin. President Wyatt Baek confirmed that the IPs matched the IPs for Google Fiber, which Emma Bunnell, a prominent Anti-Excelsioran Gaplan politician, uses, leading him to believe she was possibly behind the coup.
"Ok the currency part sure makes it sound like Emma. She's been complaining about Excelsior's currency for an unimaginable time. Mountain View is pretty close to here, and that's where Google Fiber gets their ISP from and Emma uses Google Fiber. I don't know maybe it's her but honestly I'm not involved in this." - Wyatt Baek
From this possible evidence, the BIC investigation began to take more interest in the possibility of the coup being Gaplan-based, especially after Baek revealed a message from Bunnell stated she wanted to "take down Excelsior". IAGF also began investigating and sent a fake email to the "deathtoexcelsiornow@gmail.com" email address, looking for a response. During this time there was very little activity from the group behind the coup, the "Flower Arrangers", with them sending no messages or emails to any Government representatives.
- ↑ Quote by Nicolas Caiazzo, 6 January 2022