153:, in Tanzanian territorial waters. The following year, U.S. President Jameson Weed and his staff meet in the White House. The United States of the year 2025 is suffering from a long period of economic stagnation, exacerbated by the effects of peak oil and global warming. Weed's plan to take control of the Tanzanian oil gets support from Vice President Leonard Gurney, a
165:, but is opposed by Secretary of Defense Bill Stedman, who believes the plan is asking for trouble. Overconfident and unable to conceive of an American military defeat, the Weed administration decides to launch a regime-change operation, including threats, bribery attempts, paid rioters, and accusations that Tanzania is a ruthless dictatorship. Meanwhile, the
307:, and the Indian Ocean. As investors around the world realize that the United States is no longer a hyperpower, they begin selling U.S. dollar-denominated investments, causing the dollar to fall sharply. This leads to high inflation and a major economic crisis in the United States. The problem becomes worse when several large investment banks, who had taken
348:, drawing up a long list of people to be purged, including Bridgeport and many other high-ranking government and military officials. The crisis comes to a head in October when Stedman's grandson, still hacking government computers, discovers the plot and leaks it, alerting Bridgeport. As president of the Senate, Vice President Bridgeport asks the
34:
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play a prominent role) but the Weed administration tries to keep the news out of
American newspapers. As the Chinese strategists had anticipated, the Americans are unable to imagine that they might actually be defeated, and therefore double down on their existing military strategy, further depleting
332:
Harbin, trying to protect the administration, arranges to have
Stedman, the former Secretary of Defense, assassinated to prevent him from testifying before Congress. However, Stedman had been aware of this possibility, leaving instructions for his computer-whiz grandson to leak his documents in case
180:
while delivering a blow to
American military prestige, and they receive eager assistance from America's numerous enemies and victims. China is able to keep its plan secret, and thus the American forces are taken by surprise when they launch the invasion in July 2025. The Chinese disable the American
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risks that had been intended to pay off when the United States won the war, become insolvent. With the dollar in free fall, the federal government cannot bail out the banks without risking a total collapse of the dollar, and so banks go bankrupt, and the United States enters an economic depression.
189:
which they had smuggled unobserved into
Tanzania. The American fleet is not prepared to defend itself against this new generation of missiles. The Americans shoot down many of them, but as one missile after another finds its way through the ships' air defenses, the fleet is devastated: most of the
363:
Bridgeport becomes
President, and although he enjoys personal popularity and a reputation for honesty, he cannot overcome the near-universal perception that the American government is broken beyond repair. As the dollar has lost more than 90% of its value over the past year, Bridgeport recalls all
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only required the United States to accept the loss of Kenya and Diego Garcia, the defeat and the ongoing war between Iran and Saudi Arabia cause the price of imported oil, already high, to skyrocket, and the United States faces an energy crisis. Knowing that his navy is obsolete and U.S. troops in
340:
At the convention, a resolution calling for a constitutional amendment to ban unfunded mandates passes easily, but the delegates cannot agree on anything else. After several weeks of deadlock, a proposal to outright dissolve the United States of
America surfaces. The shocked delegates pass the
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The
Chinese and their African allies drive the American and Kenyan forces back into Kenya. With so many ships and aircraft already lost, the Americans cannot easily resupply their land forces. The Weed administration escalates the conflict by attacking a Chinese military base directly. Aghast,
333:
anything happens to him. The government falls into a crisis of legitimacy, with anti-government rhetoric and donations to extremist political parties reaching new records. Other states join the call for a constitutional convention, and the convention opens in
September 2026 in
364:
American troops home from overseas, and tries to work with
Congress to balance the budget with tax revenues a tiny fraction of what they had been before the war. It is too little, too late, however; numerous states begin to ratify the dissolution amendment, starting with
320:
on the military misadventure that had ruined the country. The hearings proceed anyway. Gurney's recovery plan involves a grandiose rearmament project that the United States can no longer afford, and a domestic spending plan based almost entirely on
315:
The new president, Gurney, inherits Weed's cabinet, including Harbin, with whom he has begun an extramarital affair. He appoints
Senator Pete Bridgeport as his new vice president, as an incentive to protect the administration from
274:
responds by promising an all-out nuclear war if the United States acts on its threat. A potentially cataclysmic nuclear crisis unfolds. When local authorities fire on panicked civilians trying to flee the city of
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The members of the Chinese government's inner circle, knowing that they have reached military parity with the declining United States, follow a brilliant Chinese professor's plan to help China's
491:), not Tanzania. This implies that the president's staffers were so overconfident or ignorant that they could not even name their plans right, although this is not addressed in the novel.
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rather than their efficacy in combat and they are even referred to as 'Lardbuckets' by both their pilots and ground crews; as a result, the Chinese military is able to gain
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Under the illusion of invincibility we still tell ourselves that 'this time it's different' but as we shall soon discover, forces far beyond our control have other ideas.
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253:, taking control of the island. By September, the government of Kenya has fallen, and the American forces are trapped and must surrender. Iran, with promises of a
460:
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The distinction between America's major political parties is portrayed as irrelevant. None of the major politicians' political affiliations are ever specified.
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Twilight Last Gleaming reflects Greer's overall pessimistic views about the future of the United States and industrial civilization. Elsewhere he says:
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Tanzania had become an oil exporter before the discovery of the offshore oil field. In 2015, Tanzania was not a significant oil producer.
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141:. This prompts an intervention by Tanzania's ally, the People's Republic of China, with disastrous consequences for the United States.
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Stedman resigns as Secretary of Defense. The Chinese retaliate by launching a surprise airborne attack on the American base at
137:, in which a declining United States attempts to gain control of some desperately needed oil by overthrowing the government of
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283:) openly defy the federal government, implementing their own plans for surviving the crisis, including the possibility of
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The president of Russia bore a personal grudge against the United States, blaming it for his father's suicide during the
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The United States remained dependent on imported oil. All attempts to reduce this dependence, including domestic
356:, convicted, and removed from office in one day. Gurney flees the country and is killed by unknown assailants in
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had become King of the United Kingdom. In 2015, William was second in line to the throne after his father,
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becomes the thirty-eighth state to ratify, and the United States of America officially ceases to exist.
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are vulnerable, Weed evacuates them, effectively shutting U.S. power and influence out of Africa, the
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passes a resolution calling for a constitutional convention to ban unfunded mandates.
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for military protection, and convenes an emergency meeting of Congress. Gurney is
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In Washington, Gurney and Harbin draw up plans to avert dissolution by means of a
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In the following weeks, the states begin to arrange themselves into a number of
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of fighting for oil, appeals to his country's ally, China, for protection.
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The military operation, Blazing Torch, was supposedly named after the
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from the Chinese for stirring up trouble, launches an invasion of
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In the year 2024, significant oil reserves are discovered in the
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Greer published a short version of this story on his blog, the
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Meanwhile, the Army and Air Force launch a land invasion from
601:"The Archdruid Report: How It Could Happen, Part One: Hubris"
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Weed escalates the situation further, threatening a limited
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India and Brazil have been granted permanent seats on a
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Some of the speculations that Greer made in this novel:
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312:Weed resigns the presidency and commits suicide.
483:. This design was actually based on the flag of
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431:The United States had participated in wars in
220:fighters, were selected for their ability to
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505:Automation is mentioned briefly, but mass
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21:Twilight's Last Gleaming (disambiguation)
579:Greer, John Michael (25 January 2017).
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341:resolution, and the convention closes.
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439:in the years before the novel is set.
350:Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
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542:Greer, John Michael (October 2014).
707:American speculative fiction novels
408:Speculations about the years 2024-5
226:politically connected manufacturers
208:aircraft (transported covertly via
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19:For similarly named articles, see
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470:Prince William, Duke of Cambridge
500:economic depression of the 1990s
489:Democratic Republic of the Congo
605:thearchdruidreport.blogspot.com
464:United Nations Security Council
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687:Novels set in Washington, D.C.
682:Novels set in the Indian Ocean
448:is still a nuclear state, but
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294:Although the terms of the
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27:Twilight's Last Gleaming
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161:Ellen Harbin, a hawkish
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667:Novels set in the 2020s
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224:for their
487:(now the
437:Venezuela
422:biodiesel
391:regions.
385:Rust Belt
354:impeached
285:secession
234:Australia
171:a history
84:Publisher
76:Published
564:15 April
498:Russian
461:reformed
454:disarmed
450:Pakistan
426:Peak oil
418:fracking
370:Nebraska
327:Arkansas
309:unhedged
243:matériel
236:and the
139:Tanzania
54:Language
586:YouTube
549:(Paper)
433:Ukraine
57:English
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358:Brazil
210:Russia
163:neocon
44:Author
485:Zaire
446:India
281:Texas
206:PLAAF
202:Kenya
100:Pages
62:Genre
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566:2017
553:ISBN
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