I’m curious which bit of “In my opinion” you thought was a threat?
Not very Federal of you Mr. Vausienne. Tut tut.
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Well, sure. The Amarr are sure that exposure to their beliefs and ways will convince you of the rightness of them. The Gallente, much the same thing. The Caldari don’t want their routines disrupted. And we…
We have reason to be mistrustful of outsiders coming into our space, you know? Even our inter-Tribal and inter-Clan relationships are stabilized by their boundaries. The Parliamentary government failed, in part, because it didn’t respect our cultural boundaries, and sought to dismantle them at a legal/political level.
We want to be left alone. We see the continued efforts by the Amarr to make our captive relatives into ‘Not Matari’ as a massive invasion and intrusion on our culture. Our relatives are part of us. My family is more important than I am. Assisting those of us who are captive, who are enslaved… believe me, Mizhara’s insistence that saving them is worth all of our lives… it’s not uniquely hers, and many of us who’ve opposed that view have opposed it only because we don’t to doom others in the process.
@Kalaratiri isn’t wrong, though. There are those who’ll take the time to explain… but I think your preferred method of understanding, what works best for you, is immersion, and while you might get a bit of the form of what it means to be Matari, or Sebiestor, from those explanations… it still won’t be fast, and to really understand… yeah. Years.
‘I think they should have gotten more money’ is not ‘so I am going to give them more money’. Saying she thinks the Federation did not see nearly the scale of response it might have seen doesn’t mean she’s offering to show you that response.
But you chose to be belligerent, rather than get clarification, didn’t you? You chose to see a threat where one wasn’t offered, and to respond with—in that context—assurances of violence all your own. Think about that, as you accuse us of being violent and savage.
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Of course I got clarification – that it was an impotent threat with no ability to carry through.
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It wasn’t a threat in the first place you moron.
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Oh, empty commentary then? Got you.
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Actually, seconded, @Rafal_Vausienne: it wasn’t a threat.
A threat, at minimum, hints at a future action or event. This was more like “we should have used titans”: a reflection on the past.
It does carry a certain lingering feeling, though.
… wow you’ve fallen way off of what you were hoping for.
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I think it’s less a feeling of “we should have” and more “I’m surprised we didn’t”. For me Colelie is actually a story of restraint in the face of the kind of emotion that burns planets.
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No, you got clarification that it wasn’t a threat at all. You are quick to judge people as belligerent when no belligerence has been offered. She said the Federation got off easy. It could have been far worse. The bloodshed on both sides could have been far costlier. And then there’s the bigger picture:
As wrong as that would have been the Republic, irrational and driven by grief and pain already as we were, would not have felt the loss any more deeply. Our opposition—the Empire—was already trying to play the role of ‘good guys’ under Doriam and Jamyl I. To launch an aggressive war then would have undermined everything they were working toward. It would have instantly closed the rift the Ray’s assassination had caused, and the State likely would not have supported an attack. So they wouldn’t have attacked. The Empire had everything to gain by sitting back and waiting. But what of the State?
The State, remember, that was already planning the reclamation of Caldari Prime. Federal forces engaging Matari forces on a much, much larger scale? The smart strategic move is to aid the enemy of your enemy: support the Matari. Had there been a larger conflict borne of that incident, the State could have easily opened a second front. Between the two, the Republic and the State could have inflicted crippling losses to the Federal fleet. Yes, the bulk of the Republic Fleet would have been lost as well, but it’s not like we’re not used to fighting back with pointed sticks when that’s all we have. The Gallente fleet, though, would have been savaged.
And through it all, the Golden Fleet, the expansionist, aggressive, enslaving culture that stopped its insatiable devouring of the cluster only because it was matched by the Federation’s military power… would not have lost a ship. Would have been building more.
Play it out. What’s the endgame for the Federation in that scenario?
Everyone got off easy.
That’s not a threat. It’s an observation. That you choose to see a threat speaks only poorly of you.
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Oh right, so a desire to inflict even more damage, violence, and death of Federal personnel at Colelie in prosecuting an action other Republic commentators have stated was a terrible idea to begin with?
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Informal advisory to State and Imperial diplomatic corps: it appears that, to avoid diplomatic incident escalating to possible war, it may be desirable to deal with high-ranking Matari exclusively on Republican sovereign soil. . . .
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Or at the very least make damn sure no one kills them.
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I think, Aria, the danger is less on State and Imperial territory. We don’t trust them. The sense of betrayal wouldn’t be there.
We trusted the Federation. Past tense.
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Or rather a wish that they had. Idle, but illustrating a lot of feeling.
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Or simply a statement that she’d expected more force to be used, and an observation that far more force could have been used. I can say ‘huh, I’m kinda surprised we only dropped 2 titans on that gang instead of 60’ without saying ‘I wish we’d dropped all 60’.
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Might be. “Got off easy” is a little loaded as far as what’s deserved as well as what’s likely, though.
Care to clarify, Kala?
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(And yes, I’m fully aware that now I’m being pretty patronizing. It’s a joke, I promise. Nothing more.)
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Well, there’s also the point that Kala basically verified exactly what I was making concerned noises about, Arrendis. The clarification here seems to be that while Ms. Rhiannon might not have meant what I was seeing in her words, I wasn’t exactly just speaking from pure prejudice. Only, Kala seems more willing to own it.
Proud of it, actually. Which is scary from a diplomatic angle, but also really, really interesting.
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Little of column A, little of column B. Arrendis is right in thinking that “Got off easy” applies to a surprising lack of force deployed.
At the time however, I would also certainly have supported the use of more and bigger guns.
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Okay. Thanks, Kala.
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I am quick to judge belligerence, because as recent history has shown at Luminaire, at Ratilose, and at Colelie, it is others who have displayed a willingness for belligerency resulting in attacks on the Federal homeland and the deaths of Federal citizens by the armed forces of foreign powers.
The era of diplomacy and rapprochement on the part of the Federation should be considered over. That while it remains an ideal, it is an ideal that cannot currently be met insofar as the Empire, State, and Republic continue to harbour hostile intentions as regards the Federation. The point of Us or Them was passed long ago, and while it was not the Federation that crossed that threshold, the Federation has to recognize the reality that it cannot truly live in peace with its neighbours.
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