One way or another, a slave is a slave.
I find myself agreeing with practically everything you said.
As I stated before, my lobbying efforts towards the beginnings of such a thing has had only minor results. I am no big player in State politics, considering my organization only has ownership of a handful of borderworlds over which we exert control. But that isnāt the only card in my hand. My organization is cultivating business relationships with the Sebiestor tribe, and weāve founded a small number of tribal-corporate enclaves within the Kurala constellation made up of Minmatar immigrants. They mostly consist of Sebiestor, though there are a smattering of individuals from other tribes as well. Theyāre all chartered under a capsuleer corporation, bypassing a number of State immigration and foreign-worker restrictions, though to be frank, the State generally doesnāt pay much mind to the border territories when it comes to civilian activities. so long as all the taxes are paid and nothing wifts of Federal intelligence action.
I quite agree, of course.
Just saying Reclaiming takes complex forms, and the interplay between weapons of mass destruction here and surely we would not attack you our valued allies there is, in fact, incredibly effective.
1 Like
They might ā however there are still others for the Amarr Empire to attempt to reclaim first.
From my position, political leaders in the Republic such as Maleatu Shakor have consistently called for violence and open warfare against the Amarr Empire. This has unsurprisingly drawn the ire and response of the adherents of Reclaiming in the Empire. If the price of peace for the Caldari State is the sacrifice of Matari lives and blood in war against the bellicose Houses of the Empire such as that of Sarum, then that is a sacrifice I am more than willing to make.
The Amarr Empire has been waging a constant campaign of violence against the Minmatar people for over seven hundred years. Calling for us to defend our people against aggression is hardly a thing the Caldari would refrain from.
2 Likes
It likely entails as much refrain as being involved in foreign wars or the expenditure of Caldari lives to people owed no obligation.
Also, as to this?
Except youāre not the one making it, are you? The Caldari are supposed to be an honorable people. What honor is there in telling someone else to make sacrifices on your behalf? Worse, itās short-sighted and self-defeating. Because it doesnāt buy you peace. It buys you tolerance, and even that, only temporarily.
Instead of being willing to stand against those who do not believe that you should be allowed to hold to your own traditions now, while there are others to stand with you, you encourage the State to appease them, to curry favor with them, to be their lapdogs and lickspittles until there is no-one left to make the sacrifices for your self-determination that you havenāt the courage to make for yourselves.
And on that day, when the State has no potential allies left, and the Empire is stronger than theyāve ever beenā¦ what excuses will you come up with then?
While itās true that theyāve been fine allies, and I have gladly worked with them in the past and would do so in the future against both the Federation, and pirates, I know many of them enough to know how devoted they are to their god and empress. If they were called on to conquer the State, their faith and honor would demand that they do.
Iām not saying we should seek hostilities with the Empire; our culture doesnāt really have an interest in that path. But should the Republic and Federation fall, I think we can foresee what would happen.
That being said, itās very unlikely that the Federation would simply disappear. So I donāt think we need to worry about it too much.
1 Like
If the Republic falls, the Empire will take a few centuries to re-secure the ārebel provincesā and consolidate their gains. Then, with three-quarters of the cluster aligned against the Federation, they will use their agents and spies to foment a bloody cassus belli that sees the Federation responsible for some atrocity against the State. This will have the second-order benefit of civil unrest in the Federation, as billions of angry democrats decide to vent their spleen about how terrible their government is for engaging in such a horrible act of provocation. And when the State responds with anger, the Empireās agents will push ever-so-subtly to inflame the matter further, until there is more violence, probably once again āperpetratedā by the Federation.
And then they will oh-so-helpfully assist the State militarily. How it unfolds from there depends on how āhonorableā that particular butt upon the throne is. An āhonorableā sovereign would take the opportunity to destroy the Federal Navy and begin planetary invasions.
A less-than-āhonorableā one would take the opportunity to reinforce Caldari defensive positions with the Golden Fleet, sending a token force to assist with the ācounter-offensiveā. And though the Caldari Navy would of course win most of their engagements, they will all come with heavy losses, as the Amarr let the Caldari take the brunt of the casualtiesā¦ until at some point, the war will have cost so much, and so many lives, that the Empire will āreluctantlyā take the State as a protectorate, to defend their valued allies, of course.
Pity, how soon after that, the Stateās internal hierarchy will begin to conform to Amarr standards. But then, what would be the point of continuing to produce your own ships, when producing more ships for the Imperial Navy is a more efficient means of defending the Caldari Provinces?
1 Like
I didnāt tell men like Maleatu Shakor to equivocate a desire for peace or rapprochement as treason. I didnāt send assassins to kill anyone who might disagree with violence as a recourse to dialogue with a bullet to the head and a notepad for their troubles.
If the end result of such decisions was the Empire letting Sarum off their leashes then I wonder at any surprise at the end result of violence. Did Shakor not get the war they wanted?
Iām not going to be goaded into action over speculation of the future just to help a people who might struggle with the consequences of their own actions.
I never said you did. You did however, indicate that
I simply pointed out that you arenāt making that sacrifice. To frame it that way is to claim payment you have not made for a serviceāpeace for the Caldari Stateāwhich you have received.
If we are making the payment for your peace, then can you really say that there is no debt or obligation?
Either such a debt exists, or you should not be so flippant as to make claims that honor would then see as incurring such an obligation.
Yes, because the Caldari State never made any agreement with the Republic.
The Republic choice for war with the Empire has the consequence that it occupies the more militant elements within the Empire was the choice of the Minmatar people to do so, not Caldari.
That what is detrimental to the Minmatar is fortuitous for the Caldari is simply circumstance. One cannot be in debt to good fortune.
Irrelevant. Youāre staking out a position that claims sacrifice on your behalf, which youāre accepting. If youāre attacked unexpectedly, and a stranger saves your life, does your honor allow you to claim that because there was no pre-existing agreement that he would do so, you owe him nothing?
That would be a very odd concept of āhonorā for a people who place such high stock in it.
Personally, Iād say there was no such sacrifice offered, but then, Iām not the one making that claim.
So then your concept of honor would hold that a random passerby saving your life is meaningless, and there is no debt? Interesting.
I would say if a random passerby intends to save my life, I would owe them a debt of gratitude.
However, I have not seen any intention on the part of the Republic to save or defend the State. The intentions of the Republic is to attack the Empire. Doing so has the effect of occupying militant forces within the Empire which has advantages to the State as it precludes them considering invading the State.
So no, I see no need to honour the Republic for the unintended consequences of their own intentions and actions.
Sadly, your fears are well founded. Whenever the more militant elements in the Empire rattle their sabers too loudly, observers in the State look at each other askance and imagine this exact scenario.
But is it really that likely? I wonder. Contact with the Jove has changed much. CONCORD has changed much. The capsule has changed much. If the Republic and Federation fall (which itself is unlikely), I could just as easily envision Empire and State back to back against a rising capsuleer outlaw empire in nullsec.
I had a comrade at the Academy - a citizen, but a Khanid immigrant. To the other cadets, he was a strange bird set in foreign ways. But get him alone over a game of shatranj and ask him why his family came, and it was crystal clear he admired the Caldari Way. People like him, and to a lesser extent the whole Kingdom, embody my personal hope for the future.
2 Likes
A well written and delivered argument, but not against a position anyone here has taken Iām afraid.
No, I highly doubt the State or the Tribes lack any kind of certainty in their own ways or āfaithā in our cultures. This however is not even remotely close to the points being made here, which lies in intents and what will come in the future. The Tribes have little interest in taking over New Eden, and the State is so famously ironclad in their culture that I doubt they could if they ever wanted to. The Federation certainly would, but in their own chaotic and haphazard cultural way.
The Amarr, alone in New Eden, is religiously, culturally and politically intent - outright and clearly stated so - on cluster domination through any means necessary including conquest. This has nothing to do with the certainty of ones own ways, but about the intent to force it upon everyone else, at any cost, as laid out in your Scriptures, in your politics and your very identity as a nation.
So yes, thereās quite a lot of us in all the other nations that believe in a brighter future, where the Amarr identity has been sufficiently destroyed that something better and less of a threat to all of New Eden can be built in its stead. Until then, youāre simply going to have to live with the fact that your own words, zealotry, culture, politics, religion and actions all say the same thing: We are a threat to you all.
If it comes as any kind of surprise that this is taken at face value, one has to wonder what you actually expected.
3 Likes
As I said, then: an interesting version of āhonorā.
There is a difference between having faith and confidence in the ways of oneās people, and believing that all other ways must be extinguished. And that is what spreading your ādivine orderā means.
If someone tells you āI intend to murder youā, itās generally a good idea to believe them.
Just as there is a difference between hiding from our neighbors, and simply not insisting that our neighbors will eventually need to become our minionsā¦ or else.
I personally like and have liked a lot of people that a lot of people probably think I should not over the years and some of whom might be shocked to hear that I do themselves - from the pirate Ethan Verone to Admiral Gaven Lokāri, from my little angel Kalaratiri to the terrorist Harkon Thorson, from the kybernaut Torvik Ironsides to Ishukone loyalist Alexandre Hinkelmann. And there are close allies and even kin that I do not like half as well as theyād deserve - I will refrain from mentioning examples on a public forum, youāll excuse me.
I do not, sadly, live in a world where personal likes and dislikes matter much. Allegiances matter, loyalties matter. Trust matters.
Liking people and loving them is a nice distraction, a spice to life that would otherwise be dull and without that certain spark.
But I could love you and I could hate you, and it would not really change anything, except the kind of pain the emotion brings.
Which is it, then?
Would it change anything if you knew?
12 Likes
What is crime inside Imperial territory is decided by the Imperial authorities, not outsiders.
I have to admit though,I thought Republic was a bitā¦ older, but anyway, please forgive me, we donāt study foreign history a lot, only history and culture weāre usually interested in is our own.
I do understand though the concern of being called āRebel Provincesā, and because Iād consider a gallentean whoād call our State as a ārebel province of Federationā to be overly agressive and those who could claim that Caldari are those who live in the Federation - to be straightforward mentally unwellā¦ YET, to my knowledge, the Empire took this politics only after Minmatar invasion into core Imperial worlds in YC110, before that they were seeking peace and coexistence according to their doctrine of Pax Amarria.
And that they called you ārebel provincesā just means that the days of the Republic might end quite soonā¦
Well, we arenāt minmatars to become slaves to the Federation, Honorable death in combat is preferrable.
Yet, you see where the difference is:
In the conflict that started YC110 we are protecting ourselves against the Federal aggression and weāre fighting to get our Home back (Caldari Prime), which now is still partially occupied by gallentean invaders.
In the same conflict that started YC110 between Empire and Republic it were actually Empire who are protecting themselves against the Minmatar aggression.
Yes, I know, the Empire invaded the Republic thousan years ago - but that was thousand years ago.
And even the rebellion happened 143 years ago - you won it, you shall cherish your land, not seek new conflicts with neighbors. Just like we won our Independence from gallenteans 200 years ago - we werenāt touching them until they began ramming their nyxes into our peaceful stations, even while they were holding our Homeworld a hostage. We were trying to trade for it in a peaceful way.