In my Moroccan campaign, I rapidly militiarized to combat the republican Maratha Confederacy, who have been invading my holdings in Europe. I sent my first army as an expeditionary force to tavel overland to India, as the Marathas currently rule the waves. I decided to simply strike directly at India itself, bypassing the Maratha holdings in the Middle East. However, I noticed this interesting situation on the way over:
Sometime ago, Persia had rebelled against the Maratha Confederacy and reformed into an independant state. The Marathas had supposedly decided to leave them alone and instead focus on Punjab, which had also rebelled and expanded in India.
Unlike Punjab's successful resistance following its rebellion, Persia has instead descended into the form of a failed state. Shortly after its independance from the Marathas, Persia declared bankruptcy and suffered a revolution because of this (bankruptcy negatively impacts the happiness of the capital region). The monarchist government forces were able to defeat the revolutionary army, the remnants of which were driven into the eastern parts of Persia. However, the victory was costly and left the government with only 2 damaged military units. Without the necessary coins to retrain its troops or hire more men, Persia could only sit back helplessly as the Marathas blockaded its ports and the rebels ran around pillaging the countryside (not numerous enough to directly attack the feeble Persian army, I guess).
In case you didn't know, bankruptcy also drastically decreases a faction's region wealth in its capital region. Moreover, rebel raids were decreasing the Persian population, as well. I don't know how long this has been going on for, but Persia is at 2352 region wealth (decreasing by 230/turn) and 13 million people (which has stabilized with the negative impact inflicted by devastation by armies). It's crippling itself.
I think I'll destroy the rebel army. The next one that pops up should hopefully be strong enough to take the Persian capital and restore the state to prosperity.
