Ultimate Rat Diplomacy
Plan A: Invading and defeating the Under-Nation was concluded to not be a good idea, because it IS IMPOSSIBLE TO TOTALLY WIN AGAINST RATS IN FALLOUT 1 AND 2
Thus, the fortifications were being built while there was still time to get ready for the final conflict.
The introduction of stealthboys would become a major breakthrough, capable of bringing massive benefits through a new, elite force within the Brotherhood of Steel equipped with them. Whoever is targeted by them won't even know what hit them.
Testing proves airships aren't really as effective for close-air support and aerial interdiction roles as they are for strategic bombardment, something which won't be very useful here. Thus researches are being done to create faster, smaller, lighter and more versatile bombers in the future.
The Chosen One might have made mistakes in this present, but it is only thanks to his heroism that the Enclave haven't completely wiped out the entire Wastelands. He will be forever immortalized and honored in the annals of the Brotherhood, no homo.
In time, the Brotherhood began to enact Plan C. They establish an extensive intelligence network in the Under-Nation, for more purposes than only knowning the extent of their army numbers, while trying to appease the Founder with gifts in massive amounts of cheese. And thus they questioned the old adage that IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO AVOID COMBAT IN FALLOUT by conducting Rat Diplomacy of their own.
Eventually, the Brotherhood found out the crashed remains of an alien spaceship. Caring more about knowledge than salvage, they began to study it, hoping to find out useful technologies from an attempt to reverse-engineer this thing.
Those who thought the other Brotherhood of Steel was evil, fascist and tyrannical had no idea of how things would turn out for the original Brotherhood of Steel. Their policy of enslaving outsiders for every possible of their own whims has been expanded exponentially, and now a large amount of Brotherhood members owned slaves, mostly for pleasure rather than work, for slaves weren't seen as worthy of craft. The degeneracy of the Brotherhood once they came out of their isolationism and reclusion meant the last arguably "good guys" in the wastelands have been corrupted.
While the Shi already gone all the way into slavery, like the Koreans in the past. Only they had too little manpower to go zerging, because if they did have what it takes, then the Brotherhood would have enacted Plan A against the Under-Nation.
The crashed alien spaceship was useful after all, accelerating the progress of many ongoing Brotherhood researches, while new minigun squads were readied.
With the fall of the Warriors of Ice, with the exception of the Darrien Tribes that strangely were still resisting, the Brotherhood of Steel and the Shi Empire were the last remaining civilizations in the whole known continent of America still not conquered by the might of the Under-Nation. Now it could be the beginning of ITZ, or not. After all, they had more than enough forces in the border with the Brotherhood to attempt an invasion for a long time.
The primary purpose of the Brotherhood of Steel: the recovery of pre-war and development of new technologies and knowledge, is succeeding beyond all expectations, and the people inside the Brotherhood feel proud for all they have achieved. Of course having toilet paper, plumbing, hot showers, slaves to GAHAHAHA and water on taps have a bit to do with it as well.
Now it was already 2256, and the rats still didn't invade the Brotherhood, fortunately, but they couldn't count on this to go on forever. Sooner or later ITZ will come, and Plan C had many drawbacks, but they didn't give up on the ambitious project, no matter how many were lost. Like the previous heroes of the Wastelands, the Brotherhood now counted on single individuals to deliver a crushing blow against the Hivemind, like did the Vault Dweller against the Master and the Chosen One against the Enclave.
The Brotherhood is characterized by hilly landscapes, and thus it is only logical the neglected field of terrain-specific tactics, now that the ultimate generalist doctrine has been researched, begins with crag fighting. Hopefully these researches will be very important to ensure at least the capability of keeping the rats at a halt in case of an invasion.
Plan B was also not really dismissed. If truly necessary, the Brotherhood would, once they have researched enough to be able to build them, resort to nuclear weapons as a means of destroying the Under-Nation. Hopefully Plan C would succeed before this becomes a necessity rather than an option, for who knows if the rats wouldn't have nuclear weapons of their own again, and if a major nuclear war happened, then, without doubt, this would be the ULTIMATE Rearmageddon for Kwanzania, and if something like that happened, there would be no survivors at all besides the very filthy rats they sought to exterminate one day.
Later in the same year, the first expansions or recently built fortifications are raised over all borders the Brotherhood territories sharing borders with the Under-Nation.
In spite of the ever-present threat of the Under-Nation and of successive failures for performing the daring final act of Plan C, hidden through deceit from the rats, as the Brotherhood mastered the art of Rat Diplomacy, the economy within Brotherhood controlled territories Prosper significantly, specially due to recent researches improving infrastructure and societal policies(if slavery could be called one).
Finally, after centuries, a New World Order was rising from the ashes of nuclear devastation, and the world was reaching a point where part of the few remaining human-controlled territories of it besides the Enclave could finally be compared in prosperity and infrastructure to pre-war developed countries. A new educational paradigm was being raised as well, that included even formalized University degrees. The Brotherhood has finally opened a proper opportunity for the best among the outsiders to join their ranks: all those who performed excellently in these new universities would be recruited.
Meanwhile, for all those who once thought a direct, military invasion of the Under-Nation was a good idea, this piece of information finally silenced those who still advocated Plan A. For it is easier for a paper dog to catch an asbestos cat in Hell than for the Brotherhood to even survive after declaring war against such a legion, unless of course, they exterminated all of them with nuclear weapons and air supremacy.
In face of the Prosperity of the economy, the Brotherhood has decided to launch a major effort to improve the infrastructure of its territories. A new, post-nuclear industrial revolution was beginning as once again, steam-powered trains and freshly built railroads featured the landscape.
It is 2257, fortunately the rats still didn't bring war, and the Brotherhood can now build mainframes, while in review of the Under-Nation, against which yet another attempt of Plan C's final act has failed, it is realized that, for some reason, the rats became far less oppressive than they usually were. Something was gradually changing in their society, but still, they had to be wiped out without mercy for enslaving human beings and...
Nevermind.
Placed in the otherwise strategically unimportant Baja, the first nuclear powerplant of the Brotherhood of Steel is constructed. Plan B's first step is finished.
Extensive improvement in aerial tactics like cooperation between air units followed by gradual improvements of Brotherhood airships, leading to the flaunted "Sky Fortresses", are a common policy now, as it is believed that, for Plan B, the Air Force will be essential for both blocking any potential Under-Nation bombers from attacking while escorting their own.
Meanwhile, a brave man volunteered after many previous ones have failed. His mission was a dangerous one. The final step for Plan C require ultimate courage, sacrifice and skill. The man had to get deep within the core of the Under-Nation beneath Rock Springs, and sneak through it with the support of a stealh boy until reaching The Founder himself, while retaining enough discipline to not be mind controlled. Then, the Warrior would have to do something that would change the world forever.
This man was called Paladin Cleveland Mark Blakemore.
Supported by the vast Intelligence network of the Brotherhood of Steel within the Under-Nation and by their stealth commandos, Cleveland has succeeded at reaching the dangerous Rock Springs, as now the most difficult part of his mission approached. With his ubermensch agility and IQ above 180, he managed to predict the exact movements of all patrolling guards and avoid them in a matter of seconds, and the few who spotted him were dead before they could alert anyone. He began to crawl through the burrows, knowing well what awaited down there.
There he faced the very manifestation of what he predicted. Rats devoured hungrily slabs of babymeat slapped with cutted underwears, fortunately distracted enough to not notice him sneaking through. Manboons were victims not of Machete Rape Gangs, but of rats eating them, mutilating them, playing with their intestines and getting inside their anus. It was a horrible vision what happened inside those underground tunnels, a vision that would have broken a lesser man.
In time, he found the one who started everything. The Founder was a vicious rat, but even then he could perceive that he was an uber-ratte, probably far more intelligent than the average manboon, if not equal to Cleveland in IQ. Nobody else has managed to get this far before. In fact, no human has ever seen the Founder private quarters. And there, everything was set. He lunged and quickly plunged a syringe into the Founder, who immediately seemed to become unconscious. Not wasting any time then, he grabbed a device: a strange leather helmet connected by a thick wire to a far smaller one, and wore the larger helmet while putting the smaller into the rat.
Having weighed the options, the Warrior purposefully strides into the Founder's brain. While this union of man and rat represents an end to the hero's humanityl, it also promises rebirth with the power and resources essential to rescue civilization from the brink of oblivion. With the mind of the Warrior working in conjunction with the Founder's sheer intellect and psychic powers a new Under-Nation arises, and immediately near all human beings within the rule of the Under-Nation are given full citizenship rights and their freedom back.
Many rats have been shocked by the new policies of the Founder, justified as part of a plan to make an eternally stable world empire that would no longer suffer with rebellions. Many rats were slaughtered. In fact, most of the Third Rat Council died. While other rats, seeing this would interfere little in their lives besides depriving them of a larger amount manboons to toy with, for slavery remained even if in a far more limited degree than before, promptly filled the gaps from the great purges against those who tried to kill the Founder as he changed.
Contact is immediately established with the Brotherhood Elders and an alliance is formed. While no longer an opponent the Under-Nation chooses to not directly serve the Brotherhood, a delegation of the top Brotherhood Elders departs for Rock Springs to discuss details of the new alliance, they never reach their destination. Brotherhood soldiers are dispatched to investigate; however no traces of the ill-fated expedition are found. The impact on Brotherhood morale is devastating, for every soldier knows leaders define rules and rules shape the Brotherhood.
The Founder quickly integrates with the surviving Brotherhood leaders; inane rats knowledge of Brotherhood procedure begin to handle operations in Brotherhood outposts. Under-Nation minions are sent to bunkers and allied towns to ease the strain of basic needs like patrols, while maintaining a military show of force to keep outlaws at bay. Soon the alliance is discarded with all forces now under one leader, the Brotherhood is once again reborn. To speed the unification process discrimination against rats or humans is outlawed, the new Brotherhood views all as a valuable resource to be exploited instead of threats to be eliminated. Old hatreds and fears are soon set aside as humans and rats work together to carry out the Brotherhood's plans for transforming the wastelands into a civilized society.
The new regime has thus conquered the entirety of North America, and quickly dispatches those that would halt progress. Soon the Brotherhood is a protector with entire continents under its influence. And thus, although The Founder's original consciousness perished, ironically, it were the actions of the Brotherhood of Steel that sealed the fate of the continent and forged the Founder's original ambitions of conquest.
As the new Founder's power grows so does his hold on the continent but one question remains; how to deal with the beaten back but remaining threat the Enclave possess. It will not be as easy to eliminate the Enclave in its highly fortified strongholds in the northern islands of Alaska, but it must be done, for in the end there can only be one leader. One who is willing to sacrifice anything or anyone to unify the wasteland.
I dedicate this update to all who hoped for an epic final battle by the Brotherhood of Steel.
Fortunately though this is not the end yet no matter how close it seems to it. No need to keep surprises though. It's obvious what the next update will be about:
DEATH TO ALL MUTANTS, RATS AND TRAITORS OF HUMANITY
*Edit: And before you ask, being a Neanderthal, Cleve would be considered a Mutant by the Enclave manboons, thus why he joined the BROtherhood of Steel instead.