Volgograd

Early History
Called Tsaritsyn in the early days, the city on the southern frontier of Russia remained an administrative backwater until the invention of the railroad made it into an important trade city along the Volga. After the First World War, it was renamed 'Volgagrad', or 'Volga City', as part of a program of national administrative modernization. It served as a jumping off point for Russian forces patrolling the unstable Caucus region, and became a primary base for the Russian Cossack forces in those conflicts.

The Five Year Chaos
In the days following the collapse of the Russian Empire and the death of the Tsar, Russian forces commanded by General Rykov attempted to stabilize this usually unstable part of Russia and capture the city from temporary Neo-Bolshevik occuptation. The operation was unusually successful early on. As Communists and rogue military forces swept over Russia, Volgograd held strong under the Rykov regime.

A Turkish invasion of the region forced Rykov to focus his attention south rather than toward Moscow. In late December of 1970, Turkish forces crossed the Caucus and occupied several old forts south of the city. A week later, the city was completely under siege. Rykov and his forces were forced to extirpate themselves from the city and fight a guerilla war against the Turks. This conflict lasted for eight years, though the last years saw a dimming war between besieged Turkish defense forces in the cities against a countryside that was essentially liberated.

The Volgograd Confederacy.
When the Turks were finally driven from the region, Rykov managed to maintain most of the unified alliance of Cossacks and loyal Russian villages, though only loosely. Rykov's government never formed an official status and remained little more than a military alliance policing the battered southern territory. The results are that of a military state, funded by a permanent emergency tax system and a number of foreign enterprises both legal and illegal. Smuggling into the broken Ottoman Empire became a main-stay of their economy. The threat of danger from all around has created a sort of camaraderie based stability.

Physical State
Years of war has battered the city and hardened its people. Volgograd sits along the Volga river, surrounded by the flat steppe of south-central Russia. It's place as a relatively stable city in the last few years has led to an influx of immigrants fleeing the collapsing Russian Republic.