[GalFed] A Statement of Condemnation of the so-called "Gallentia Primacy"

Fiction Portal Intergalactic Summit
101

Except you’re missing the entire premise of my original post. The militia warzone is a grey zone of interstellar affairs. There is an interstellar order established by the signatories of the CONCORD Assembly where at least for now there is agreement to adhere to its rules and treaties, where unilateral military action in that context has potential repercussions, and economic interdependence through SCC regulated free markets makes total war undesirable compared to the financial benefits of maintaining the status-quo of CONCORD.

CONCORD signatory states remain constrained in their actions and hostilities towards perceived rivals. This is where presenting rivals with escalatory dilemmas for hostile action towards them makes operations in the grey zone of diplomacy appealing for nation-states knowing the constraints that presently exist.

The militia warzone isn’t about a decisive victory for one side or another, it’s when the parties involved recognize the benefits of having a destabilized security framework on their shared borders with a rival state and where de-escalation or deconfliction is not desired as is the present case.

An example of an operation in the interstellar grey zone is indeed Floseswin. The invasion by House Sarum of Floseswin presented the government of the Republic with an escalatory dilemma: The Republic military could have responded with overwhelming force against the forces of House Sarum and curtailed the invasion rapidly; however doing so would have risked a military escalation and response from the Amarr Empire which might lead to a war the Republic was not yet ready to fight.

I believe Arrach Sarum knew this from the outset and either an escalation from the Republic threatening absolute war or as was the case a more limited Republic response leading to months of attritional ground fighting would have led to an advantage for House Sarum as the vanguard of Imperial Reclaiming. Either the Republic would instigate a broader conflict as Sarum desired or as happened the months of ground fighting would allow Sarum to position themselves as the political and religious leader of a new Reclaiming movement within the courts of the Empire in contravention of the previous diplomacy of Amarrian leaders such as Emperor Heideran VII.

However, the initial beachheads and landings by House Sarum into Floseswin would not have been possible if local space superiority in the system had not been achieved and held by the capsuleer and regular forces of the 24th Imperial Crusade. In this one can see how the militias while not being able to be decisive in ‘winning’ a war can create the space and opportunity for nation-states or factions therein to take advantage of in a grey zone operation.

Which is what the objective of grey zone operations are: exploiting opportunities and weaknesses presented by a rival state to create the cumulative advantages desired prior to full escalation of armed conflict.

Such opportunities and weaknesses abound to be exploited in the future within the militia conflict zones.

102

You really are determined to die on this hill, aren’t you? The biggest problem with hyperbolic rhetoric like “not about the established order whatsoever” is that if anybody reading can think of even the slightest possibility or the most far fetched of circumstances where the Empires might care about literally anything other than what you claim here to be their sole and exclusive concern… they can understand the flaw in your argument.

I’m happy to agree that the Empire governments manipulate their capsuleer auxiliaries, and that they do so in part to maintain control over loyalist capsuleers. I have made that argument myself many times. But again, you push the argument too fair by claiming that’s the whole story. Empire governments are not monoliths. They act, or refrain from acting, according to a variety of factors. Control over the capsuleer population is a rational priority for them to devote resources and effort to, but it is not their only priority.

103

They’re allowed to be wrong, yes.

That might be a valid position to claim if your original post had actually talked about that, instead of about changing the international status quo.

No, Arrach Sarum was not doing what you seem to think he was doing. Arrach Sarum was saving face. Arrach Sarum had the planet-wide Reclaiming of Floseswin IV declared on these boards, after it was pointed out that AmarrMil capsuleers in his military circuit were making deals with Minmatar Militia capsuleers to not challenge control of certain system. He was pointedly embarassed here, in public.

No, Arrach Sarum was not engaging in any 12-dimensional Chutes & Ladders. He got goaded into a reaction. And even if that weren’t true, House Sarum has been the singular driving ‘We need to resume Reclaiming by the Sword’ force in the Empire for decades.

So he wasn’t trying to gain something he already had.

104

Because the militias don’t carry out revisionism of the established order imposed by CONCORD, interstellar nation-states do. What the militias are useful for is the promotion of instability and violence in border regions between nation-states that make grey zone operations possible to conduct.

If you want to dismiss the actions of the militias and their capsuleers as irrelevant that’s really on you, but that did not prevent incidents such as in Intaki, Floseswin, or Turner that were directly influenced or made possible by the actions of militias and their capsuleers, nor will it prevent other such actions in future.

105

None of those were ‘made possibly by the actions of militias’ any more than it would be correct to say that Bob operating a concession stand in a sportsball stadium was only possible because of the invention of the ball.

The actions of capsuleers were incidentals that were assumed would eventually take place at some point once the empires set the bloodsport in motion. Lai Dai’s incursion was possible because the Fed didn’t care to block it, Floseswin was possible because the Republic didn’t care enough to change the status of the system, and Turnur happened because it was the right kind of star in a system the Empire didn’t care about. Capsuleers weren’t so much a consideration as they were just one more environmental condition, like the level of radiation or the timing of the tides on Intaki.

They will do what they want, when they want, irrelevant of your imagined contributions.

106

If you want to believe that, by all means do so.

107

I am still curious about how raiding ORE and their Upwell affiliates is somehow some kind of revolutionary new way to fight the big bad Caldari State.

I know one doesn’t end up a Gurista for their impeccable charisma and intelligence, but surely they can at least try, no?

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108

Ironclad logic on display. I concede. BLDZ operations are clearly no basis for concern for either the Federation or Caldari State authorities. Nothing to see here, move along, everyone.

109

You understand how that’s a hole in your logic, right? To me, you are just a sad little pirate attacking ORE, nothing more, nothing less. It is you that claims that doing so in State-controlled systems is somehow an attack against the State- so… what about that first attack in Federal territories, where you and your corporation actively participated in raiding corporate outposts, even engaging FDU pilots during them?

110

Perhaps she thinks that forcing down the security status of high security systems is really putting the hurt on State operations there? Even though the biggest impact it has is on capsuleer trade and travel, and the megacorp security forces are well trained to hunker down and fight off invaders for periods of time (i.e. Sansha). Or maybe she believes that hitting ORE facilities is causing some form of economic damage to Caldari companies by driving the price of materials a few percentage higher? Even though all the megas have their own vast mining divisions.

Either way, it hardly matters to me. I’m rooting for her, to be honest. Every hit they make against ORE is another little sting of vengeance on behalf of the Serpentis Corporation, whether they realize it or not. Let her and her little band play pirate, I say.

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111

I am under no obligation to relieve your confusion. In fact, I find it more than a little amusing.

112

Something tells me you often find yourself easily amused.

May I recommend watching jingling keys? I am sure you will find it to be an absolute blast.

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113

I follow the evidence, and I’ve been at this long enough to know better than to think capsuleer efforts accomplish much of anything, most of the time.

114

“Most of the time,” eh? We took issue with your analysis, not the evidence. If you’d offered that simple qualification from the start, I wouldn’t have even disagreed to begin with.

Here’s the part that puts the berry on top for me:

Remarkable that from your statement we are to surmise that only the nullblocs are apparently worthy of attention. How many years did you spend in null, by the way?

What a marvel the infomorph ego is. With all our training and cybernetic enhancements, still vulnerable to such a simple cognitive bias, imagining that our experiences are more meaningful and important to the world around us than anyone else’s. I believe the Jovians called it “Main Character Syndrome.”

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115

Yes, because there are rare exceptions where capsuleer efforts have some effect. But it’s not in the warzones. It’s in situations like the EDENCOM efforts, where the Trigs were clearly targeting 81 systems (3 * 3 * 3 for each Clade) but settled for 27.

Attention, but not concern. They use the warzones for their purposes, and use nullsec for their purposes as well. In the end, the null blocs mean as little to the empires as the smallest group of highsec miners.

Enough to know none of it matters. All that blood, all that killing, is meaningless.

Important? We are disposable. We are not immortals, we are tissue-paper people, replaced without care or thought. There will always be more to replace us, and they know it. And anyone who’s actually paid attention has known this has been my position for over a decade.

But good job getting your analysis completely wrong.

116

And only within the Union, as recent political overtures from the Federation have made abundantly clear.

The Federation has rarely been as noble and selfless as it claims to be, so it should come as no surprise that every so often that mask should slip to reveal an ambitious, imperialist mindset in those in power, no different then that of “less liberal” nations.

While I applaud anyone advocating for the virtues the Federation was supposedly founded on, I have to ask: Isn’t this just a lone symptom of a wider moral corruption within the Federation? One that puts short term (economic, military, and electoral) gains above the virtues and goals of the Federation’s founders?

And if the very soul of the Federation is so easily sacrificed by its people, was it ever special to begin with?

I hope your people can turn this around, and find the courage to stand as a beacon of freedom in a dark universe, but tracing the political developments of the past few decades, it feels like it’s been racing in the opposite direction for a good while now.

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117

I must admit that I have patently ignored this thread as other matters have arisen that have taken my attention, which matter far more to me than the usual malady that afflicts any thread pertaining to Federal matters that my illustrious counterpart Doctor Devara has diagnosed above.

On the off chance that this is not a reoccurrence of the above, and believe me, I have become quite disillusioned with responding to every response that inevitably attracts to my posts, I shall offer my thoughts as follows:

The Gallentia Primacy are predominantly focusing their efforts at subverting the Union from within the Federation, rather than attempting to bring about wholesale political change externally. The Primacy and its leaders have made their case to the people of the Federation, and your selected part of my condemnation relates to those very people who have and will reject their toxic philosophy. Therefore, I’m not sure what you are trying to say unless this is a form of political support for the Primacy? Which I hope it is not.

Whilst Senator Tailler was elected to the Federation’s high office, the Primacy has not had its ideology reflected in the ruling Federal government of the day and thus it cannot be said that the Federation has this ‘Imperialist’ mindset that is so commonly trotted out by its detractors. No, it can be said, but it would be incorrect to suggest it so.

Again, I am unsure of your point as to what you are trying to imply. Forgive me if I am not perceiving you correctly - an extreme minority terrorist group that espouses an ideology that has been rejected as legitimate and decried as most immoral is not a symptom of widespread ‘moral corruption’ in the Federation. If it were truly as systematic as you suggest, we would not have seen the Intelligence and Justice apparatus of the Federal Government work tirelessly to uncover the criminal acts of Senator Tailler and to expose the Primacy as a terrorist organisation. It would have been concealed, or worse, we would have witnessed far greater collusion at an official capacity.

It pains me to witness our foreign allies (and regardless of what the Treaty of Airaken dictates, I continue to see the Republic as an ally of the Federation) consider that we are failing to maintain the high standards that we set for ourselves. The Union has always stood for the common good, through our shared principles of democratic governance, freedom and equality for all mankind, and justice for all before the law. Regardless of the validity of the criticism levied towards us, our perception abroad matters just as much as it does domestically, and thus redoubles my earnest desire to see the stain that is the Primacy wiped out from the Federation.

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118

This is good.

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119

You should not make assumptions about people.

Something Kybernauts tend to ignore when boasting about their martial achievements.

Where have you been anyway? I have not seen a sign of life from you since the day you recruited me for the Floseswin campaign.

I would not consider that the norm. Politicians will always make noise, but warriors who have gone through the fire together will have bonds forged between them by the heat, and those are not pulled apart by the strokes of pens lightly.

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120

While I disagree with Rinai I have to say I am disturbed by your criticism of certain pastimes. It has been scientifically proven that the aural emanations of certain metals in tandem can provide neutral or regenerative effects. I personally find a little jingle helps me synchronize internally and externally. In a similar fashion turning a humble bottle of foam soap upside down and upright again and observing the way the bubbles move can be de-stressing. It’s my procedure when I feel the need to meditate upon the loss of a ship.