JeffEngel wrote:... [Elvis Santino was] a moral coward willing to lose them all rather than look bad. My hat is off to her.
Santino wasn't willing to "lose them all" because he didn't expect his forces to be utterly destroyed. His intention was to do some damage in a passing engagement at maximum range with the vast majority of his forces, (including his own precious backside,) escaping with only minor damage. His ONLY priority was not being seen as a coward for surrendering the system without at least token resistance. By the standards of any previous action against the PRN/RHN, his intentions and results should have matched fairly closely.
Given the difference between past experience and the unknown current reality, I don't find it at all unrealistic that his subordinate commanders accepted his "plan" without dissent.
