3
An Outside Perspective on The Children of Mercy's Military
The Children of Mercy spend a lot of effort and resources on their military, which is simply given the eerie designation of "The Order". They are expected to have an overwhelming amount of soldiers relative to their population, standing at over 300,000 active members.They practice brutal Scorched Earth tactics on both the offense and defense and drill their citizens from birth to be ready for martyrdom in His name. Refugees fleeing the advance of The Order have reported that they take slaves and wantonly slaughter and destroy that which they consider dissolute. It is reported that they use cutting edge equipment and do not stay their hands from using chemical, biological and incendiary agents pursuing total warfare. They have largely leaned into infantry warfare and have created a ring of defenses surrounding their nation. In offenses, they are slow but thorough, using vast bombardments from artillery pieces and moving not unlike chess pieces on a grand board.
Their slowness should not be mistaken for clumsiness, though. On top of encouraging brutality and offensive violence, they are trained and greatly experienced in fighting a wide variety of opponents that used many different tactics. Units come in many varieties and stand ready to repel rapid offensives, armor and aircraft. Furthermore, they are willing to sacrifice every life in the name of ultimate victory. If this means burning thousands of people on an audacious assault or making citizens in nothing more than peasant garb use suicide bombs, they will do so.
They have performed well against groups that rely on partisans and autonomous units as they practice wanton, persistent brutality: relocating and enslaving questionably loyal enemy populations while killing those who even slightly resist. While they struggled at the beginning of their formation, their fully defined statelet seemed impervious to many behind-the-front operations.
Against an air-heavy remnant of the United States National Guard, they suffered many casualties before adopting necessary technologies to detect and combat their enemies. Their lack of many missiles means they use a lot of twin-cannon emplacements and looted MANPADS.
Their greatest weakness seems to be more cohesive forces that embrace modern technology and have less restrictive ideologies backing them. In these cases, they endeavor to cause so much shock and terror that the civilians of said nations will want to stay their hand in order to prevent excessive civilian casualties.