[MH] Vile Vortices and Supernatural Threats

Icelander · 04-14-2019, 07:45 PM

The PCs are employed by the centenarian Texan billionaire J.R. Kessler to counter or contain supernatural threats that arise in connection with the 'Bermuda lozenge' Vile Vortex or any related ley lines, confluences, Places of Power or telluric currents.

The yearly budget of Kessler's monster hunting activities are around 250-300 million USD. I thought that national intelligence budgets of nations with interests in the Caribbean would surely dwarf anything that a private citizen, however wealthy, could afford.

I discover, however, that ABIN, the foreign intelligence service of Brazil, the largest and richest regional power where there is any kind of coherent official response to the supernatural (most governments don't even believe in it), is only about the same as Kessler's budget for his personal crusade.

The CIA has a 15 billion dollar yearly budget, but how much of it is spent on anything relevant to the Caribbean, I don't know. I assume it's enough to make it more powerful locally than any Latin American intelligence or security agency, but I must admit that this is just a guess. If the CIA budget was distributed around the world strictly by population (which it isn't), the Caribbean operations of the CIA would have only slightly more than $100 million for their yearly budget.

Taking the budget of the entire US intelligence community, it's about five times that, so unless the US focuses more assets on the Caribbean than is average for the world (which is not unlikely, however), the informal monster hunting organization of the PCs' Patron might actually have a budget of about half that of the US intelligence community when it comes to intelligence and covert operations in the Caribbean.

The difference is, of course, that Kessler and his network are aware of the supernatural, exclusively focused on it and have a coherent strategy, whereas the US as a whole has no unified supernatural policy.

Related to these ruminations, I have some questions.

How much of the total US intelligence budget is likely to be focused on the ca 1/140th of the world population who live in the Caribbean?

How much of their foreign intelligence budget is Brazil likely to focus on the Caribbean?

What other important players are there in the intelligence business in the Caribbean?

That is, how much expense and manpower are the British, Dutch and French, for example, dedicating to intelligence and security for their Caribbean possessions?

Who else has both significant power regionally and strategic or security interests in the Caribbean?

04-14-2019, 07:45 PM	#19
Icelander Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Iceland*	Budget of J.R. Kessler's Monster Hunters The PCs are employed by the centenarian Texan billionaire J.R. Kessler to counter or contain supernatural threats that arise in connection with the 'Bermuda lozenge' Vile Vortex or any related ley lines, confluences, Places of Power or telluric currents. The yearly budget of Kessler's monster hunting activities are around 250-300 million USD. I thought that national intelligence budgets of nations with interests in the Caribbean would surely dwarf anything that a private citizen, however wealthy, could afford. I discover, however, that ABIN, the foreign intelligence service of Brazil, the largest and richest regional power where there is any kind of coherent official response to the supernatural (most governments don't even believe in it), is only about the same as Kessler's budget for his personal crusade. The CIA has a 15 billion dollar yearly budget, but how much of it is spent on anything relevant to the Caribbean, I don't know. I assume it's enough to make it more powerful locally than any Latin American intelligence or security agency, but I must admit that this is just a guess. If the CIA budget was distributed around the world strictly by population (which it isn't), the Caribbean operations of the CIA would have only slightly more than $100 million for their yearly budget. Taking the budget of the entire US intelligence community, it's about five times that, so unless the US focuses more assets on the Caribbean than is average for the world (which is not unlikely, however), the informal monster hunting organization of the PCs' Patron might actually have a budget of about half that of the US intelligence community when it comes to intelligence and covert operations in the Caribbean. The difference is, of course, that Kessler and his network are aware of the supernatural, exclusively focused on it and have a coherent strategy, whereas the US as a whole has no unified supernatural policy. Related to these ruminations, I have some questions. How much of the total US intelligence budget is likely to be focused on the ca 1/140th of the world population who live in the Caribbean? How much of their foreign intelligence budget is Brazil likely to focus on the Caribbean? What other important players are there in the intelligence business in the Caribbean? That is, how much expense and manpower are the British, Dutch and French, for example, dedicating to intelligence and security for their Caribbean possessions? Who else has both significant power regionally and strategic or security interests in the Caribbean? __________________ Za uspiekh nashevo beznadiozhnovo diela!