Islamic Caliphate

The Islamic Caliphate (Arabic: al'khilafat al'iislamia) was the name of a vast Islamic empire that took hold three times during the Century War. It adhered to the Salafist Sunni Muslim ideology and enforced Sharia law upon its citizens.

The Caliphate was also known as the Islamic State or IS and popularly known as ISIS (a reference to the earlier Islamic State of Iraq and Syria a terrorist group that engaged in the original attempt to restore the Islamic Caliphate well before the Century War).

The Islamic Caliphate traced its roots to three powerful radical Islamist organisations: The Taliban in Afghanistan, Boko Haram in Nigeria and Niger and the Islamic State in Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Somalia. During the Century War, almost the entirety of North Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia as well as Malaysia and Indonesia fell under the control of Caliphate loyalists at some point.

The extreme violence perpetrated by the Islamic Caliphate was one factor that led to the decline of Sunni Islam in many areas controlled by the Caliphate, and the growth of Sufism, Ahmadiyya Islam and Binsan, as well as a revival of Zoroastrianism within India and Iran.

Pre-Century War
The modern Islamic Caliphate was inspired by medieval Islamic Caliphates that had existed over a millennium prior to the Century War, the first being the empire of the Prophet Muhammad in Arabia, which later expanded under his successors (Caliphs) to include much of North Africa and Asia, allowing the religion of Islam to initially expand into those regions.

Initial formation
The three constituent groups who merged to create the Islamic Caliphate (Boko Haram, the Taliban and the Islamic State) had existed previously as terrorist cells long before the Century War. Their sudden increase in support and military strength was due to the increasing animosity towards Muslims in Europe, including formation of the anti-Muslim terrorist group Revenant, which ultimately took control of the entirety of the United Kingdom and large parts of Europe, and engaged in the genocide of Muslims there. Huge numbers of muslims escaped Europe and flocked to the areas controlled by Islamist groups, and these groups took up arms against their host countries and gained large tracts of land.

West Africa and the First Caliphate
The United States invaded large portions of West Africa in order to combat the advancing Caliphate, and also invaded the Levant and the Arabian peninsula. The huge sums of money spent on the war ultimately led to the southern states of the US rebelling against the government and forming the Confederate States of America. The Indian military seized control of lands under the eastern (Taliban) branch of the Caliphate. The threat of the Islamic Caliphate helped galvanise the hundreds of disunited tribes in Sub-Saharan Africa, and unite them behind Roland Sassou, who would later become the leader of the Grand African Alliance. The Caliphate ultimately lost ground, and was confined to the Islamic Emirates of Maghreb and East Maghreb, situated in former nations of Niger, Senegal and the Gambia.

The Second Caliphate in Africa
Three years after the withdrawal of the United States from West Africa, and one year after the Turkish invasion of the Euro Alliance, the Revenant group triggered the formation of a second Islamic Caliphate by detonating a hydrogen bomb in the Islamic holy city of Mecca during the Hajj pilgrimage, killing over 6 million people, in 88 BU. In the aftermath, Saudi Arabia declared itself the new centre of the Islamic Caliphate, and seized lands controlled by Turkey. As a result, the newly formed Euro Alliance and the Russian Federation declared war and invaded the Arabian Peninsula. The West African Islamists seized lands and eventually controlled an area stretching from Senegal to Nigeria to Egypt to the Libyan coast. However, this would not last long, as an invasion by the United States and the Euro Alliance, combined with growing nationalist and anti-Islamist movements in the region, pushed the West African Islamic Caliphate reduced it to small loyalist territories in Mauritania and Libya, which were eventually seized by the Averte Statum.

The Caliphate in Indonesia
6 years after the beginning of Indonesian imperialism in Southeast Asia as Greater Indonesia, the government of Indonesia declared it's allegiance to the Islamic Caliphate, and began to enforce full Sharia law upon it's people.

Indonesia continued to invade Australia, but Australian forces combined with Philippine and Chinese assistance ultimately defeated the Islamist forces in Indonesia in 77 BU, after 8 years of war.

Indonesia was subsequently partitioned, although Malaysia and Singapore, which had been occupied by Indonesia even before it came under the control of the Caliphate, were granted independence.

The Third Caliphate
Beginning in 77 BU, the Euro Alliance had virtually collapsed and was being replaced by the Averte Statum, and the Russian Federation was suffering from numerous internal separatist movements that destabilised it's government and weakened it's military. After the Russian separatist movements occupied most of the country, Russian forces withdrew from Turkey, the Levant and the Arabian peninsula and allowed for the Islamists to reclaim that land, with the Islamic holy city of Medina at it's heart.

As the Russian government withdraws from Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, it allows for Islamists to reclaim this land as well, and they seize their former lands to the South that are occupied by the Indian military. This results in the formation of the Eastern Caliphate in Central Asia, separated from the Western Caliphate by Persia, Azerbaijan, Caucasia and the Caspian Sea. The Eastern Caliphate is short lived, and through a joint invasion by India and the newly formed Republic of Aral, it is defeated in 64 BU. The Western Caliphate exists relatively peacefully for 2 more years, and then attempts to reclaim Muslim dominated lands in Africa from the Averte Statum. After eight years of war against the Averte Statum and their Turkish, Kurdish and Persian national supporters, the Caliphate is finally defeated at Medina in 54 BU