Woodbridge (1983: Doomsday)

Introduction
A survivor nation in the county of Suffolk in eastern England that grew out of the airbases at Bentwaters and Woodbridge. In the aftermath of Doomsday the garrisons of those bases assumed a leadership role in their locale.

In the aftermath of Doomsday refugees fleeing from the lawlesness in the city of Ipswich made their way north as amateur radio enthusiasts had got notice of signals from Bentwaters and Woodbridge

Although the official name of the nation is Bentwaters/Woodbridge that name is only used on official documents. Most if not all of the people who live in the nation have taken to calling it Woodbridge mainly because that is where the parliament sits and thus it has become the de facto capital.

Pre-Doomsday
Bentwaters and Woodbridge were once USAF bases

Doomsday and the immediate aftermath
Cut off from central command after DD the two bases found themselves relatively unharmed. Seeing as how they were very close to each other and more or less a twin base the first thing the bases did was make radio contact with each other. The fact that both bases were still in working gave them hope and they dispatched survey teams into their immediate vicinity. In the days and weeks following Doomsday each base was overwhelmed with injured and non injured survivors and it became clear to the commanders of the bases that it would be best for everyone concerned, military and civilian if they would take charge of the area.

Politics
Woodbridge was, for a number of years run by the Military Command Council which consisted of the senior officers of the military bases that give the state its name.

Over the years since Doomsday Woodbridge has taken direct control of a large part of the southern and eastern parts of the county of Suffolk. It also claims to be in control of the city of Ipswich but this "control" actually consists of semi-regular scouting missions and raids against the gangs that have made the city their home.

In early 2000 after a number of large protests by the civilian population the Military Command Council agreed to hand over power to an elected civilian government. It was agreed by all parties that the new political system would be more or less identical to that which governed Britain pre-Doomsday with two exceptions. Firstly it was agreed that the parliament would be a single-chamber body. Secondly any government would have a fixed term of five years. Elections were held in 2001 throughout the territory held by Woodbridge for the new parliament. The leader of the largest party in parliament forms the administration and has the title of Prime Minister. Serving members of the armed forces are not allowed to run for parliament although they are allowed to vote. Elections in Woodbridge are run under the first past the post system, ie whichever candidate gets the largest percentage of the vote is elected whether or that percentage consists of a majority of the votes cast. The Liberal party have pledged, if they ever form the government to bring in some system of proportional representation.

The Woodbridge Parliament has 80 members all of whom belong to one of four parties: The first three are continuations of the pre-Doomsday parties whereas the Veterans Party as it's name suggests is a party founded by former members of the Woodbridge military, both American and British that campaigns for veterans' rights and a strong military.
 * Conservatives
 * Labour
 * Liberals
 * Veterans Party

The current "big question" in Woodbridge politics is what sort of connection Woodbridge should have with the other survivor nations in Britain. Some think Woodbridge should apply to join the Celtic Alliance, others think that as the Kingdom of Cleveland is ruled by a child of the previous monarch then they are the legitimate successor to the old Kingdom and that Woodbridge should come under their rule while yet other think that Woodbridge should remain fully independent. This question is partly a generational one as the older a person is the more they supportive of the idea of joining with Cleveland as they remember the "good old days" before Doomsday. The Conservatives and Veterans are largely supportive of there being some connection between Woodbridge and Cleveland whereas both Labour and the Liberals are fairly evenly split between becoming part of the Celtic Alliance and remaining fully independent

International Relations
In 1999 a long-range helicopter scouting party from Woodbridge was forced to make an emergency landing outside of London. Soon after the landing the commander of the scouting party was extremely surprised when they met up with some well-armed soldiers. After a rather tense stand-off talks between the two units began and the Woodbridge commander learnt that the other unit was from a nation styling itself the Celtic Alliance which was based around the old Irish Republic. This was the first time news had reached Woodbridge of any other survivor nations in the whole of Britain. In the subsequent years there was more and more contact between Woodbridge and the Alliance and one of the first acts of the democratically elected civilian government in 2005 was to propose an exchange of ambassadors.

Through the contact with the Alliance the people of Woodbridge have learnt much about the post-Doomsday history of the world and have begun to become part of the community of nations once more.

Woodbridge has close links with the survivor community of East Britain in Lincolnshire. The two entities became aware of each other in 2006 when a trawler from Woodbridge entered a harbour in East Britain. It had got lost after a storm and saw the harbour and thought it may be a safe haven. The skipper of the trawler made himself known to the local authorities and promised to return another time. When the trawler returned to Woodbridge the skipper told the government what had happened. After some discussion the Woodbridge authorities decided to make official contact with East Britain and a diplomatic mission was sent consisting a member of the cabinet and a few soldiers not to mention the trawler skipper.

There is an agreement in place that as Woodbridge improves its military capablilties a lot of the older weaponry is sold to East Britain at a reasonable price. The "military" of East Britain as it stood before contact with Woodbridge was largely armed with extremely old fashioned weaponry with only a few shotguns. Not does Woodbridge supply East Britain with weaponry it also gives the East British military training in the use of such weapons.

Woodbridge does have occasional problems with raiding parties from small surivor communties from Norfolk although the way the Kingdom of Cleveland dealt with the "pirates" of Burnham Deepdale points the way to a solution to that problem

There is currently some discussion about Woodbridge applying for membership of the Atlantic Defence Community

Military
More to come

Economy
More to come

Education
More to come

Culture and media
There are currently four radio stations These first three stations are run by the WBC or Woodbridge Broadcasting Corporation which was founded in 2001 when Woodbridge again became a democracy. A lot of the people who work for the WBC formerly worked for BBC local radio pre-Doomsday. Black Shuck Radio is a music station for younger people who perceive WBC2 as being a bit "stuffy"
 * WBC1 is dedicated to news and politics and the discussion thereof
 * WBC2 is a music station and plays all types of music
 * WBC Sport as it's name suggests is dedicated to sports reporting and regularly has commentary from live games
 * Black Shuck Radio

For several years the WBC has been working on trying to restore a television service to Woodbridge

Sports
Cricket and Football are the prefered sport of the civilian population and each village within Woodbridge has teams for both sports that compete in leagues and cup competitions.

Football in Woodbridge is run the Woodbridge Football Association (WFA). The current football League champions are Woodbridge FC and Leiston FC won last year's WFA Cup (an annual knock-out competition). Pre-Doomsday both these clubs played in the amateur Eastern Counties Football League. The chairman of the WFA is Terry Butcher who before Doomsday was a player for the professional team Ipswich Town

Cricket in Woodbridge is run by the Woodbridge Cricket Association (WCA). The current League champions are Saxmundham

Woodbridge American Sports Association (WASA) is an organisation that runs leagues for American football, baseball and basketball which are still popular with the citizens of Woodbridge who are of American origin (in other words the former and serving members of the Woodbridge military who pre-Doomsay were part of the USAF and their families)

Football and cricket teams from Woodbridge have, in the past few years started to play "friendly" games with teams from other survivor nations in the British Isles such as East Britain, Cleveland, Northumbria, Trent and Derwent and the Celtic Alliance. There is now some talk of these friendlies becoming a competive competion along the lines of old European Cup in football.

The WFA and WCA planning to apply for membership of the world governing bodies of their sports, FIFA and the ICC respectively at some point in the next year or so.