Ahh, I see!
So, you are one of these coward occupants. And sinking in typical hedonism like a good gallente! Very very well. Go ahead, eat and enjoy while you can, grow fat, lazy and ugly like typical gallente. When we return, we will just butcher you like pigs.
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This must be some experimental form of Garoun wit, or are we seriously expected to take a moral scolding from the race who actually DID orbitally bombard the planet in question and then destroyed a Super-Capital in low orbit around said planet, causing massive ecological damage, loss of civilian life (both Caldari AND Gallente) and immense loss of private property?
Iâm not sure which accusation requires the most extreme psychotic break - the accusation of brutality from the people who bombed and then stole a Homeworld, the accusation of cowardice from the people who rammed a civilian orbital with a Nyx DURING A PEACE CONFERENCE or the accusation of incompetence from the people who picked a fight with their own client race and couldnât win it in two centuries of epically inept warfare?
Msr, you have already so weakened your own position that I barely need to point out that the Caldari State has never been definitively linked to the damage to the Mannar Homeworld ecosystem, or that Kaalakiota did not go bankrupt at all.
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If you bought the drink in Tovil, then you paid tax on it to Ishukone. With all the major urban centers in Caldari hands, thereâs barely a club or restaurant worth the name in Gallente hands - although itâs very possible the barstaff are Gallente.
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I would highfive you so hard now, if my hand didnât sink in the holo projection.
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Tragic no doubt, but the Federation did not park it there in the first place. Its existence was always a coercive act, and every nation will feel it has the right to be free from military coercion within their sovereign borders. The destruction or removal of the CNS Shiigeru from within Federal borders was always going to be carried out one way or another by the Federation insofar as it existed as an intolerable violation of Federal sovereignty and borders.
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And here we arrive at the impasse.
So long as Caldari Prime is considered to be âwithin Federal borders,â without acknowledgement of a similar Caldari right to the system and space, then the Federation is similarly exercising coercive force over Caldari Prime, and thus verging on an intolerable violation of State sovereignty.
The solution is the full demilitarization of the Luminaire system, with either joint or third party policing and military defense, presumably executed by Morduâs Legion, much as the Intaki system and Caldari Prime itself are policed.
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Why not have Luminaire be an Amarr protectorate, with Caldari Prime its own enclave within said protectorate ?
Iâm quite sure the good citizens of Gallentia will be quite happy, knowing that the likes of the Glittering Dream on the Crystal Boulevard are protected by the holy templars of Amarr.
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What amuses me the most (It isnât actually funny, itâs quite horrible) about this is that the Federations entire military doctrine for much of the Gallente-Caldari war, was based on orbital bombardment.
They quite literally relied on the idea that whoever they were fighting wouldnât be able to shoot back.
Of course, people are quick to blame the U-Nats for that, but they didnât build the fleets overnight. They inherited that doctrine, and used it exactly as intended. For the subjugation of people deemed âlesserâ. This also blows holes in their claims at the time (which some people seem to love to parrot even today) that the colonies were secret military bases and that the Caldari were planning a violent succession from the beginning. If they believed that the Caldari people were able to fight back they would never have gone to war in the first place. What they wanted, and what many still want today, is a quick and easy genocide.
âA moment of silence is not enough. For their crimes, we must make the Caldari silence permanent.â
- Luc Duvailer, former President of the Federation. CE 23155.1.15
Iâm sure that Iâll get the usual responses of claiming the Federation has changed. The usual back-patting and self-congratulatory comments about the toppling of the Ultra Nationalists as though that was actually the will of the people.
(Youâre welcome.)
If the Federation truly had changed, it wouldnât have continued the war. It wouldnât have continued the segregation of Caldari Prime. It would have been willing to negotiate peace prior to the Battle of Iyen-Oursta, which the State had been pushing for. Iâd love to see what New Eden would be like if it had. The Federation is proud of its history. The above quote, along with others of similar morally repugnant nature, is proudly on display on the insignia of members of the Federal Defense Union.
Your constant rhetoric about how the State is childish is of course extremely ironic too. The State, even under the deranged leadership of Heth, was never as vindictive as the Federation is. You love to bring up the Shiigeru as though its presence in Luminaire was a threat to Gallente Prime, but Iâll remind you that following the recapture of Home Tibus Heth (Who was, again, a deranged lunatic) had the option to attack Gallente Prime. He could have ordered it turned into a barren rock, he could have ordered full scale war, he could have choked the life out of Gallente Prime(A phrase that we can thank the senate for, of course). He didnât, because the capture of Home was the goal, not a war. The State under Tibus Heth, the poster child for racism and xenophobia in New Eden and noted deranged lunatic, was never as warlike, vindictive and childish as the Federation and its defenders have been and continue to be.
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Iâd make it totally neutral, a place where any and all are welcome. A system State if you will, perfect for business and diplomacy.
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Civire arenât born.
Their origins are as oblong blocks hewn from the living rock of the mountains of Caldari Prime, and shaped into humanoid form in the vast orbital factories throughout Caldari space.
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Good to know my boys are half stone.
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Half stone, half jawline.
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Quite so, and both the initial invasion of Luminaire in YC110 and Operation Highlander were unilateral military actions conducted in what was deemed the national interest and in the pursuit of what is considered security objectives by the State and Federation respectively. As I have demonstrated in this thread, discussions on who was right or wrong in such matters can effectively go on forever; both sides have sufficient ammunition to justify their actions to their own domestic populaces even if the other side remains unconvinced.
Treaties are only binding insofar as their terms are considered to sufficiently reflect the interest of the parties involved in the signing of that treaty. When they do not, then the only course of action a nationâs leaders will feel they have recourse to is unilateral military actions to better reflect a new security paradigm in what is regarded their own best interests â as was seen with the violations of the YC12 Armistice and again, the YC110 ceasefire.
Discussing the morality, or the merits of an objective wrong or right in the case of unilateral state actions as regards security policies is inconsequential: there only exists what does, and what does not serve the best perceived interests of a nation or state in its foreign affairs and security policies.
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I, too, require my crew to solve puzzles when they disobey ordersâŚ
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When youâre around, dear Lasa, we all are.
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I find it hard to argue with Realpolitik.
In the interests of said realpolitik, I would point out that an eternal war can hardly be said to be in the interests of the majority of the Federation. At this point the Caracal is out of the bag - client races of the Federation CAN unilaterally escape from Federal oversight, granted with a harsh penalty.
Do I understand why the Federal Navy needed to do something about Shigeru? Sure I do. Do I get to point out that, once again, the Federation (bastion of peace and liberty) chose violence over negotation? Sure I do.
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Ever the charmer, Pieter.
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Consider this a point of speculation, but I do not believe that present or future Federal security policy has any provision for war in its conventional sense: direct military confrontation seeking the destruction of enemy personnel and material while seizing territory.
Future Federal security policy, in my view, will be based on the pursuit of a hybrid/gray zone strategy. The objective will not be the defeat of the SAF in the field but rather leveraging the scale of the Federal economy to instigate an arms race aimed at forcing the State to a point of having to decide between bombs or butter. Comparatively, both the Federation and the State have access to the exact same technologies which are the basis for worker productivity, however there is no parity as regards population with the Federation having roughly twice or two-and-a-half times the population of the State.
As such, if the Federation spends 10% of GDP on defence the State would have to spend roughly 20% of GDP. There is a point where, under such a scenario, what might be tolerable for the Federation will increasingly prove deleterious for the State. The Federation might spend 35% of GDP on defence and survive with some cuts in other areas, but if that means the State by comparison has to spend 70% of GDP on defence that will only exacerbate structural fault-lines that already exist. The State has had two wide spread worker revolts in recent memory â the Brothers of Freedom and the Provists â whose basis were complaints of workplace conditions and standards of living; forcing the State into a precipitous arms race will only foster future resentment and invite questions of political legitimacy of corporate leaders as defence spending prevents quality of life projects such as infrastructure and stymies the domestic economy for consumer goods.
While it may be considered a punitive policy, it will be aimed first and foremost at only three State corporations: Kaalakiota, Wiyrkomi, and Lai Dai, whose historical animus and belligerence towards the Federation makes them prime candidates for containment and hostile actions such as espionage, information warfare, and economic warfare (such as currency manipulation of their corporate scrip; or the pump and dumping of their subsidiary stocks). Other State Megacorporations will be given the option of either supporting the Patriot bloc and be targeted by such hybrid warfare tactics; or negotiate in their own interests and benefit from inducements such as wider access to the Federal market for exports and preferential treatments such as being afforded further access to Caldari Prime as with Ishukone.
The CEWPMA will remain locked in, because in the pursuit of objectives aimed at confronting, frustrating, and hampering the abilities of the Patriot bloc in the State it fulfills an important role. Exploration, terraforming, and the necessary development in terms of infrastructure makes colonial development an expensive business. While the actual cost of doing so has not been disclosed, the sunk costs of Black Rise for Kaalakiota, Wiyrkomi, and Lai Dai potentially represents a number in the multiple trillions of ISK. Preventing its development for the foreseeable future by the constant intercessions of militias cuts off a revenue stream the Patriots would have relied upon to grow their powerbase otherwise.
Meanwhile, the Federation will deny any opportunity at large-scale, pitched engagements with the State in order to prevent lack of popular support at home due to loss of life and justification for an oversize defence budget in the State. The only time force would be applied, would be in cases such as with Operation Highlander, where the outcome was never seriously in doubt due to prior planning. In addition, the Federation will likely continue its own buildup of anti-access and anti-denial systems such as with Tripwire, automated drone swarms, and Fleet Rapid Response protocols (as seen with the destruction of the Kador Fleet in Ratilose or the Republic Fleet in Colelie) to make any future attacks on the Federal homefront by the State far more difficult to inflict a decisive outcome such as with the YC110 invasion.
President Roden was not elected because he was political ideologue and apparatchik; he was elected to his Office because what was desired was not just another politician but a Warlord. To that end, I do not think he is playing chess (or any of its multi-dimensional derivatives) with the State like Harner â seeking to force an outcome via a singular decisive engagement and the trading of pieces. He seems more to be playing the Jin-mei game of weiqi with the State and positioning his pieces over time on the board to create a paradigm favourable to the Federation. His game is the creation of crisis in the opponent, and as the Jin-mei say: in every crisis there is an opportunity. And in every opportunity there is the opening to exploit the situation to oneâs own advantage.
This all seems obvious enough to me; which is why I remain non-plussed at attempts to try and pillory the Federation in threads such as this. While it may go some way to sway opinions, if those opinions swayed are not within the Federation itself, then I fail to see how all the public ire of foreign citizens external to the Federation will dissuade President Roden from enacting his policies as aforementioned.
Under the constitution of the Federal Union, in the provisos of the articles of self-determination, it remains an inherent right for a polity to secede from an existing member-state just as it is for a member-state to secede from the Union. Hypothetically, if all member-states were to invoke their articles of secession as per constitution, then the Federation would cease to exist.
While the Federal constitution did not exist during the formation of the Caldari State, it has existed for well over a century. As such, I do not think it is new information in that regard.
Under the Federal charter and constitution, the Federal Union and its government only has an obligation to ensure the peace and liberties of its own member-states and their citizens. Ensuring the peace and liberty of those external to the Federation would be an action of dubious legality, and peace, if not liberty, is a matter best left to CONCORD and its agencies as regards interstellar affairs.
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Itâs an interesting idea, certainly, and it probably sounds good as part of a Federal Intelligence whiteboard exercise, but there are several areas where such a policy can fail.
The first is that the population of the State, historically, is prepared to embrace a lower standard of living individually in order that the State be able to afford the most modern military in the Cluster. So long as the Federation continues to act to provide an existential danger to the State, the proles will embrace frugality as a collective good. It is so enshrined now that such measures are no longer top-down in our society - they are innovated and enforced from the bottom-up.
Moreover there is a clear disparity regarding the level of utilisation of State and Federal space. The Federation already has an inability to provide meaningful employment for all itâs citizens. The State still has a lot of room to grow into - with our population only just having reached the point where artificial propagation ceased to be economically efficient. In short, time only favours us - and the Federation provides us with the only mechanism we need to prevent a growing affluence from poisoning our productivity with a need to constantly raise our standards of living in the working and middle class.
Forcing the State to increase itâs military spending is also an interesting theory. In the scenario you posit, the State increases its military spending to an unsustainable level, causing worker revolts and the breakdown of the State from internal pressures - but that is only one possible scenario. The truth is that the State is much less susceptible to these internal pressures than the Federation and it would require far less of a push to send the Federation into a spiral of civil disobedience.
If you choose to make war with consumer goods, you forget which of us worships at the temple of consumerism.
As for hoping to split the Patriot bloc off from the Practical and Liberal blocs, you forget that these entities really only war with each other when they lack an external threat. The State does not see a difference between armed conflict and other types of conflict - we were born of an act of political conflict crossing the lines into economic and then military warfare, after all.
As for driving a wedge between the blocs, please remember that the former Executor hounded Ishukone, who he hated without reservation. Nonetheless he was unable to secure support from the other Megas to outlaw Ishukone and as hounded as she was, Ishukone never so much as considered secession from the State.
Militarily speaking, the State does not seek to take any territory from the Federation - save for one planet in the Luminaire system. Even Heth could not drum up support for an incursion into any other part of the Federation - Caldari ambitions are limited to possession of Home. This makes defending against the Caldari Navy easier, but it makes convincing citizens in other parts of the Federation of a need to militarise against the State harder. The Jin-Mei know that they need not fear the Caldari.
Pillorying the Federation, as you say, serves multiple goals. First of, despite claims of the dubious legality of expansionism in the cause of serving Liberty, we both know that a call to do precisely that bubbles up, predictably, during times of heightened crisis. Secondly, it is well to remind the Matari and Empire of the nature of the friction between the two sides - painting the Federation as a dangerous state actor, motivated by an expansionist ideology of cultural supremacy and political meddling, serves obvious goals for State diplomacy.
Such a policy resonates as a shared experience between the State, Empire and Republic, moreover. The Empire is very aware that the Federation bankrolled much of the slave revolution that cost it a third of itâs territory. The Republic is very aware of the Federationâs attempts to cultivate them as a democratic client-state. Establishing this shared experience provides a diplomatic âinâ for the State as well as reminding State Citizens âWhy we fightâ.
The truth is that the Caldari have much to thank the Federation for, culturally. Without so much external pressure compacting our society and hardening it, we would be a very different people.
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Itâs actually quite hard to say what does Federal security policy seeks, but it is quite obvious what it does. And when I look at their actions: they are exactly about destruction of enemy personnel (including non-combatants), torturing combatants and seizing territory.
Well, I would like to emphasize it one more time, it doesnât really matter what your intentions were when you commit an action (like a crime), only your action does matter. First of all, because itâs literally impossible to verify what you have in your head when you have an intention, and second, well, because your intention does not affect result post your action - it just remains your thought.
Thatâs probably what makes me angry when I blame Federal supporters in committing some sort of actions (oh, I have brought multiple examples just in this thread already, so for now I ommit getting into details), but they say me something like âbut Tibus Heth wanted to doomsday the planetâ. My typical reaction for that would be, âExcuse me, are you idiot?â Well, taking into account what I did say above, would you agree that such sort of comeback wouldnât come from anyone but an idiot? If you didnât commit something - it doesnât matter what you wanted to do, you didnât do that, and that does matter. Tibus Heth didnât doomsday Caldari Prime, and only this matters.
And returning back to the Federation, they did actually commit everything you have listed. Would you say they didnât seek that, would they didnât seek that indeed - it all doesnât matter. It is just empty vibrations in the air. What does matter is actions and facts, without any subjective interpretations.
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