You must be registered for see images
'http://i195.photobucket.com/albums/z174/StaleyBear/europersonofyear53_zps1c2d5e1d.png'
President Sander Rygaard, Man of the Year 1953
Elections in Sylvania have always been about one thing since the oldest generations still alive can remember: keeping the status quo. Ask a Sylvanian what he thought of newly elected President Rygaard and the most you would get out of him would be: “He will keep things the same and that is all I care about.” Sylvania’s adverse years were way behind her and the years to come didn’t show much in terms of political excitement, at least that is what everyone thought as 1949 came to a close and 1950 came about without so much as a whimper. Rygaard’s presidency was on course to go down in the annals of history as another inconsequential moment in Sylvanian history, not something to be proud of, but not something to be ashamed of either. The voter base demanded more of the same from their presidents and Rygaard was happy to oblige them, he had run as a last ditch effort for the Liberty Coalition, a party that had done well getting their men into the Continental Congress but never into the presidency. That honor belonged to the Sylvania First party, a conservative leaning organization bent on keeping Sylvania independent of the world’s problems. Despite the humdrum outlook for Rygaard’s presidency the goal for the Liberty Coalition after successfully convincing the voter base to install Rygaard as president was never to keep to the status quo, it had always been the plan to take Sylvania away from its isolationist tendencies, a plan was hastily put together in 1949 by then Congressman Rygaard and a few other leading Liberty Coalition congressmen, many who can be currently found in Rygaard’s cabinet.
Early into 1951, the Liberty Coalition’s plan was being refined behind closed doors where it could be kept secret. Should the unfinished plans of Rygaard and almost half of Congress be revealed pre-maturely the Sylvanian public would reject them in all sense of the word and the country would most likely be ruined in the wave of recall referendums that would follow. Unfortunately for most of the world but luckily for Rygaard and his band, the August Catastrophe captured the attention of all those who might pry into their secret dealings; however the Catastrophe also brought trouble to the shores of Sylvania as the economies of both Bantyr and Suionia were literally and figuratively destroyed, driving many of the world’s economies in recession and at the worst, depression whilst Cantignia, a nation many Sylvanians could trace their lineage to and routinely visited, was ravaged by Engellex’s savage war upon them. Sylvanians were now faced with an economic downturn and the question of whether Sylvanian isolationism could truly protect them from the many horrors that could ravage the world’s nations at any time. President Rygaard in an attempt to ward off the recession and loss of jobs introduced a large and an all encompassing infrastructure bill, designed to make the nation smaller through various modes of transport whilst also providing jobs to those now unemployed. Sylvanians gobbled up the idea, motivated by the fear brought about by the August Catastrophe.
It was in mid to late 1951 that Rygaard learned his most valuable lesson (using crisis as an example that the country was not as safe as previously thought) and found an opening to bring forward many of his changes to the Sylvanian people via the Continental Congress. By the time 1952 had rolled around he had enough support amongst the people to introduce his most controversial bill yet: the National Defense Increase Act or NDIA, an act that has been expanded twice now. The NDIA had brought about a large amount of international pressure as the power-brokers of the world viewed it as a dangerous escalation and a challenge to the power of Engellex. Great Engellex naturally objected and the Danish Imperium had unceremoniously attached itself to a condemnation of Sylvania. The months following would see a downgrade in pressure from Great Engellex itself, however Danmark would give Sylvania and Rygaard no such reprieve. Attempting to stay neutral during the Boliatur conflict, Sylvania would be subject to several foreign communications demonizing Rygaard’s military expansion and his decision to stay out of the conflict, both politically and militarily.
The spat between Danmark’s Westerveld and the Imperial government and Sylvania’s Rygaard and the Continental Congress had the makings of being nothing more than what it was: a spat. Both nations closed down each other’s embassies and began to conduct diplomacy via Engellex, increasing Engellex’s involvement in the spat, but before the spat could die down and relations normalize between the two an event occurred that would change the face of Trans-Thaumantic politics between Danmark and Sylvania forever. King Haakon the fifth of Agder had suddenly died, leaving Danmark’s king as sole claimant to the throne, something that Rygaard could not allow to happen as the threat of an entire nation’s military being entwined with Danmark’s already massive military was too much to ignore. Rygaard quickly wrote a speech championing the need for the people of the Agderike to choose their own leader and their own government. The speech was the first time a president of Sylvania had even mentioned the thought of intervening in another nation’s affairs, yet the people stood by their president and came to the aid of the Agder people. It was not long after that Rygaard made his famous new years speech for 1953 proudly proclaiming the successes of the NDIA, touting the need to support education initiatives and continue the advancement of Sylvanian technological status, which was at the time, far behind those of her enemies.
Sylvania, Frescania and Great Engellex all committed naval assets to the defense of the Agderike, a nation on the verge of civil war. Danmark continued to assert that it had a claim to the Agder throne and created a fleet over one hundred ships in size to sail upon Scania and break the blockade the three nations had set up. Despite fearing an impending break of the blockade the Danes never came, they retreated to their homeland and continued their claim, though never coming to enforce it. The retreat was the greatest political defeat seen in many years, mostly due to the cunning brinkmanship of the Rygaard administration. Danmark would from then on always be seen as a nation on the retreat, even after the spy plane crisis that almost spawned a full scale war between both nations over the Faroe Islands. The First Faroes Crisis blew over fairly quickly, Rygaard couldn’t afford to ask congress for an authorization for war, the military was not ready for it, not having fought a battle for almost one hundred years prior. In the mean time Rygaard instead sent out his Director of Foreign affairs, Autumn Viklund, to broker deals between like minded nations, from these deals came alliances such as the Occidental Defense Intelligence Network or ODIN with Beautancus and the Tripartite Agreement between Sylvania, Ivernia and the newly created state of Østveg, birthed from the troubles that plagued the former Agderike and now a staunch ally to Sylvania.
Rygaard’s greatest and most controversial moment would come only a few months later, a moment that is still in the making and can make or break Rygaard’s legacy as president. The Second Faroes Crisis came in the form of a communique from the intelligence apparatus of Cantignia, now a nation rebuilding from the Engellexic blitzkrieg waged less than two years before. The communique itself has never been published and most likely won’t be for many a decade but Rygaard Administration has said that it was this communique that alerted them to the movement of Mezhist Union naval forces in and around the Faroes. Cautiously but in a move that can now be classified as near panic, Rygaard as commander in chief ordered the Continental Navy to scout the island and verify any report of Mezhist activity. Sure enough there were indeed Mezhist military vessels coming to and from the island chain. The reaction was swift and fortuitously timed as a Sylvanian battle fleet of around thirty to fourty vessels moved to blockade the island almost eight hours before the Mezhist Union officially announced that it would purchase rights to the island from the now failed Danish state; the Danes having suffered a short but brutal civil war that ripped apart the empire and killed several royal family members, the king included.
Faced with the realities of a Second Faroes Crisis, Sylvania announced, along with many other nations, that it did not recognize the transaction between the Mezhists and the Danes and Rygaard personally claimed it as a thinly veiled attempt by the Mezhists to contain the Sylvanian state. The battle fleet once en route to blockade the island was re-tasked to invade it as Rygaard claimed in his speech “Liberate it from any Mezhist and Danish remnant influence.” The Mezhists upon learning of the Sylvanian plans to prevent them from taking the island as well as learning that the Cussians were also planning on assisting the Sylvanians quite literally turned tail and ran from the scene, leaving the island wide open to a combined Sylvanian and Cussian invasion, an invasion that ultimately proved to be an almost instant success. Rygaard’s now famed for his use of brinkmanship in world politics had won him another success on the political battlefield, a success that ultimately won him another term as president just last month. Yet despite all the success he has brought to Sylvania and those who would work with him, he now faces his most difficult challenge yet: setting up a promised independent government run by Faroese and for Faroese Islanders. While his enemies both at home and abroad have criticized him for the invasion, he now faces criticism from some of his closest allies as the military slowly takes its time securing and creating a peaceful environment where the creation of an independent Faroese government can take place.
Regardless President Sander Rygaard has made a visible impact to the state of the Sylvanian nation and its policies both foreign and domestic, policies that have quickly propelled the nation into the top tier of nations. Where once the citizens of the world would be hard pressed to find Sylvania on a map, within four years the nation is on the tips of world leader’s tounges and, for better or worse, spoken about the in the most exclusive of political circles. For Sander Rygaard 1953 is his year just as much as it is the Sylvanian Republic’s.