I've been experimenting with different starting countries on Ironman Impossible, and checking the math on various options. And the more I look into things, the more it seems like North America just outclasses most of the other starting positions. It beats most of them at their own specialties even in some of their best case scenarios, and it's much less luck-dependent than any of them too, because it absolutely guarantees you a huge pile of money in the early months no matter what happens.
Africa: I talked about Africa on a previous post about the math and day count of satellite openings, and how despite Africa being all about money... it actually gets substantially less money than North America! The only way Africa can possibly close the gap is to have an absolutely perfect satellite rush where you get 4 in the first month, 3 in the second month, 3 in the 3rd month AND the countries you can deploy satellites to happen to be high value countries up front instead of average value ones, AND North America can't just acquire Africa in May anyway (highly possible when you're launching 10 satellites).
Under that very narrow and luck-based circumstance, Africa will pull ahead a tiny amount of profit by the end of May... but will still have been unavoidably behind on money in the first 2 months when it mattered most. So the Africa option seems to be strictly dominated. It is all about money, but it gets less money in the important months even in a perfect outcome, and much less money if anything goes wrong. If you can't satellite rush, you're hopelessly behind on money as the money continent!
Europe: Saves money on Workshops and Labs. But at the beginning of the game, you aren't even allowed to start building Workshops and Labs until you get some engineers and scientists as random rewards after a random amount of time for each. And even then you're pretty much only allowed to make 1-2 of each building for a while until you get more random rewards. Not to mention you don't save any funds on the substantial costs required to build earlier access lifts, excavate, and build more power sources if you're going to try to build a bunch of these buildings anyway.
So it is literally impossible to mass produce workshops and labs in the early months, and even being allowed to build moderate numbers of them depends on luck.. And that's if you even wanted to spend all your money on that in the first place, instead of on officer upgrades and MECs or something!
For each one you DO build, you save 62 credits, plus 12 in upkeep. But... North America starts the game with 110 credits more than you due to superior country money plus saving 30 a month on upkeep for planes you already start with, gets at minimum another 110 extra credits at the start of April, and even more by the start of May, etc. (this is ignoring that North America's initial money lead means they are going to have an easier time getting out more satellites and thus have the potential to have even MORE of a money advantage). So it seems outright impossible to come out ahead of North America in terms of affording workshops and labs in the early months, and luck-based whether you're even allowed to try... and probably not the best starting strategy to begin with.
South America: You get an absolutely dismal amount of starting money and your perk is the only one which doesn't save you money in some way. This is by far the poorest start, making it outright impossible to afford a bunch of satellites early... which makes you even poorer in the next month. No other continent will struggle as much to afford the basics like officer training... or the foundry projects which are the main thing unlocked by many of the autopsies anyway! Furthermore, this continent only has 2 countries, making it by far the easiest continent for anyone else to acquire in the early months. So far, I've never had a game where I wasn't able to acquire South America quite early. I will admit at least that I can't say South America is strictly dominated by a North America start since its benefit is not directly translatable to money like all the others are. But it seems like a benefit which is of only middling value, available to anyone else quite easily, and offset by a terrible financial price.
Asia: this is the only one I think is competitive! You pay half price for officer school upgrades and foundry projects. Well that's great, a lot of those are genuinely important and are valuable to acquire early! But the problem is that North America gets 110 more money than you to start with, and gets at minimum another 110 more money than you at the start of April, and more at the start of May, and so on.
So to really come out ahead of North America, you'd need to be buying more than 440 credits worth of officer+foundry upgrades early on, while still affording to satellite rush with your inferior starting money (because if you don't also keep up on satellites, then North America is going to have so much more money than you that your halved costs are nothing in comparison).
The trouble is that several of the really good officer upgrades are gated behind getting an officer to a very high rank. Which takes a random amount of time since it depends on when you get missions in the first place (not to mention that there's at least some randomness in who you're able to give kills to, and that if an officer you're working on training is ever wounded, that can set you back too).
Unfortunately for Asia, the best officer upgrades are dirt cheap to begin with. Squad Size 5 only costs 50, so you save a mere 25 credits there. Squad size 6 (not available till you have a major, so that's not happening for a while) only costs 75 . So that only saves you 37. Getting Iron Will early is very nice and that saves 100.
There are some great foundry projects like Tactical Rigging. Though, weirdly, for me I found that this still cost $200 for me even with the Asia bonus? Maybe that was a bug. Tactical Rigging + Iron Will + Squad Size would save us enough to get just a little bit ahead of North America if we're able to buy them all early. Though we've been neglecting that North America also saves costs on buying new planes, which we need some of. Also this does depend on several things going right. And on somehow coming up with the cash to keep up with a North American satellite rush PLUS build the foundry and officer training school early to begin with. So far, I've found that nearly impossible to do even if I sell everything on the gray market, but it might be doable if you get a lucky council mission with a big cash reward early.
But I do admit that it is at least possible to come out ahead of North America! It seems luck-based and less flexible if things go wrong, and the upside remains small, but I will admit that it's worth considering.
Of course, some Second Wave options could change these things. New Economy for example dramatically shakes this up and would make North America much worse and South America much better. But without changing the game to specifically take away North America's advantage, it seems like it's just the best in most ways.
