Tengarian Civil War

Tengarian Civil War
Loyalist Armored Convoy in the Streets of Lenovo
Date 28 November 1955 - 1 November 1957 (1 year, 11 months, 4 days) Location Tengaria Result Decisive Loyalist Victory Simeon Kovachev takes power Second Tengarian Constitution
Belligerents
Republic of Tengaria (Loyalists)	People's Republic of Tengaria
Commanders and leaders
Simeon Radez † Simeon Kovachev	Rumen Santov Todor Stoychev †
Strength
Tengarian National Army: 320,500 Other Loyalist forces: 75,000	Tengarian Republican Army: 200,000 Other Republican forces: 95,000 (estimated)
Casualties and losses
64,000 killed or injured (estimated)	74,000 killed or injured (estimated)
33,300 civilians killed

The Tengarian Civil War (Tengarian: Гражданска Война Тенгария) was a civil war in Republic of Tengaria from November 1955 to November 1957, fought between the right-wing Tengarian government and the left-wing People's Republic of Tengaria. After a disputed election and the assasination of the newly elected President, the People's Republic was proclaimed as the to be the true legitimate government of the Republic of Tengaria, ultimately resulting in an armed conflict between all sides. Lasting just under two years, the Civil War saw the defeat and downfall of both the Leftist factions in the Tengarian Republic, and the rise of Simeon Kovachev as Tengaria's primary statesman and the rise of the National Rally.

Tengaria was an Empire before the events of the Great War, after which Narozalica imposed a republic on it. The early Republic was marked with financial disasters, partisan political conflict, and government incompetence; a President never managed to secure more than 41% of the popular vote. Voter turnout was very low; few people had an interest in the workings of the republic run by a collection of mostly pro-Narozalic academics of he Renewal Party and the Reform Party. Each party often only controlled a portion of the government and not the other, and found themselves unable to do much. Initially, the Labour Party was hoped to bring about change, but when that failed as well after the two failed terms of Vladimir Vasilov, all three establishment parties began to rapidly lose public support.

The 1955 elections saw the formerly fringe Restoration Party, a pro-monarchist party, swept the elections on a platform of restoring the Empire and solving the problems the republic had faced. Essentially kicked out of the government, the three mainstream parties met together and united under the banner of the People's Party. The incumbent members of the National Assembly and the Senate refused to acknowledge the outcome of the elections. The new president, Dimitri Denov, tried a peaceful solution, but was assassinated by leftists on the way to speak with the National Assembly. The rebellious members of Grand Assembly fled Lenovo out of fear of retribution, and three days later proclaimed themselves the legitimate government of Tengaria, with Rumen Santov as their President. Acting President and successor to Denov Simeon Radez ordered the rebels to stand down, but after refusal by both, the Civil War began in earnest.

Although a sizeable portion of the National Army deserted because many soldiers had ties to the establishment parties, the majority remained on the Loyalist side under the command of Simeon Kovachev, commander of the army and a Great War hero, and as such, the Loyalists outnumbered and outgunned the rebels at throughout the war. However, although the government was more popular and had more resources, most the Republicans were able to effectively mobilize their supporters into militias. Both sides had supporters of the other side in their respective territory. Government controlled territories had Republican resistance cells causing havoc and disrupting supplies that had to be dealt with at the beginning of the wars, allowing the Republicans to establish control over their territory. The Republicans in turn resorted to killing political opponents to keep control of their occupied territory. Faced against a stronger opposition, the rebels made frequent use of guerilla warfare to distract and harry the Loyalist forces.

However, after the rebels assassinated Loyalist President Radez, Simeon Kovachev took power as provisional head of government and began the National Rally movement to bring about National Unity. With Kovachev in power, the tide began to turn rapidly. To make matters worse, the temporary unity the rebels had soon broke down into factional squabbles, which allowed for their forces to finally be crushed and defeated. Just under two years after it had began, the Civil War ended with a decisive loyalist victory. After the war, Simeon Kovachev rewrote the Tengarian constitution, giving more power to the presidency, and used the National Rally as a means to move beyond partisan conflict and heal the wounds of the war.