Overview
The Coalition is the multinational occupying power in Burn Zone. It defeats the United States in the War of American Aggression and oversees the postwar reconstruction order. Its uniformed occupation force is called COFOR, formally the United States Coalition Force.
The source text identifies the Coalition through Chinese, European, North Korean, and Russian components rather than through a complete formal roster. China is specifically connected to Hawaii peace demands and to Type 059 destroyers, while German concern over fallout is mentioned in discussion of Coalition non-nuclear high explosives.
Wartime Capabilities
During the remembered Brunn meeting, American officials discuss Coalition hypersonics, CL-20 non-nuclear high-explosive payloads, landing routes, air-defense systems, anti-submarine developments, and container-ship refits. The meeting attendees fear that President Avett’s peace terms will leave the continental United States occupied, disarmed, and politically subordinate.
Scott Hallman argues that neutral Latin states rule out a Mexico route and that the Commonwealth’s neutrality rules out Canada. This leads him to a true amphibious landing analysis. He initially treats a Cuba-to-Miami route as most practical because land-based lasers and conventional batteries on Cuban soil could protect the supply line and Miami’s port could receive ships.
The meeting also records the limits of the attendees’ understanding. Ben Auerbach says Chinese Type 059 destroyers can cover a few hundred nautical miles and are being built by Coalition shipyards by the dozen, while Carter Clemens argues that American submarines can defeat them because Coalition anti-submarine warfare is outdated. In the tribunal, Lorianna Blackstone later presses Scott on developments the conspirators did not understand, including defense-augmented container ship refits, anti-submarine advances, floating harbors, and a transition back toward shell-based naval batteries.
Occupation Force
COFOR includes international Coalition personnel and domestic American recruits. Its navy-blue jumpsuits and fatigues make domestic and foreign personnel visually interchangeable, which Carter reads as part of the point of the uniform. Connie Blye and William Laskey are domestic COFOR guards at Paul Revere High School, while Ray Bishop is revealed as a COFOR major after posing as appointed counsel.
COFOR controls the detention compound around Paul Revere High and Moulsham Community College. Rupert Brunn describes the area as COFOR special administrative territory with no civilians for at least eight miles. COFOR personnel also carry out the tribunal sentences: six enlisted men form the firing squad for Rupert after Ben Auerbach and Kelly Pearson have already been executed.
Postwar Authority
After the war, the Coalition works through the American Reconstruction Government, COFOR, and Coalition tribunals. It controls detention sites, evaluates former regime figures, and enforces the reconstructed postwar order through a new constitution, reconstruction pledges, propaganda, local rehabilitation offices, and military tribunals.