Whatever siren alerts you to the fact that nuclear missiles are inbound would be the most terrifying in my book.

There are also no toilets yet on Mars either, so it’s probably just as well.

But then they find that by occupying that country their new home is no longer any better than their old home, so then they have to attack another country to find a better home.

That one person you know who absolutely loves horses would be a lot creeper

Crazy is the new normal

Besides some of the other good points brought up here, I’d like to say that it’s because communist countries typically were/are anti-religion, so it makes sense that religious leaders in capitalist countries would oppose any form of government that seeks to limit organized religion. So, they support capitalism because it’s the opposite of communism.

NC is a stand-alone city-state, kind of like Athens in ancient times or like modern day Singapore. As for the map, I’ll let someone else more versed in the lore address that.