Battle of Manticore - am I the only one?

namelessfly wrote:Have I mentioned that Rob Pierre is my Havenite hero?

Not so much here. Imposing a murderous police state and throwing the Legislaturalists and their families to mob 'justice', keeping the war with Manticore going even though he thought was a bad idea purely to distract the mob, and not getting serious about economic reform until McQueen took out the most radical parts of the New Paris mob with the Levelers means I have absolutely zero sympathy for Pierre.

Amaroq wrote:

n7axw wrote:
Ahh, actually starting with Monica, Mesa was blipping all over the place, with Talbot Quadrant and 10th Fleet, with ONI, with Honor and Hamish, with Cachat and Zilwicki... Given Elizabeth's experience, how she reacted to the attack on Torch is comprensible. But it was her biggest mistake and it cost a lot of lives.

Don

No question that Elizabeth overreacted and reached for a "Haven-is-to-blame" scenario for the Torch attack. One thing I think about is the historical context that Elizabeth is operating under. Putting aside her personal hatred of Haven for a moment (which did have a large impact on her decision), in her entire lifetime and for a good portion of time before that Haven has been this all-conquering all-consuming nation that was steadily looming on the horizon. Unfortunately, with that history, Haven is going to take some time to not only remove that reputation but replace it with the better one that Eloise and Company are trying to build. Without the "inside" look into Eloise's character and motivations that we as readers have, all Manticore and Elizabeth can do is operate under what they've traditionally known about Haven. A few years of honest governance is not going to erase decades of mistrust.

I remember Honor mentioning that she never expected anything like what happened from Theisman (who she had a fairly good grasp of character-wise) but admitting that she knew nothing about what Prtichart was really like and that that could explain a great deal about the goings-on.

As I say, given her experience, Elizabeth's response was understandable.

But she should have went to the Torch summit with Honor and met with Pritchard...all treecatted up-- and learned the truth about the things bothering her.

Don

n7axw wrote:As I say, given her experience, Elizabeth's response was understandable.

But she should have went to the Torch summit with Honor and met with Pritchard...all treecatted up-- and learned the truth about the things bothering her.

Don

understandable, as a private citizen, but not the head of state. Talks are cheap, lives and hardware aren't. There was no reasons not at least try to talk. Only the possibility to get the head of enemy state and military into a room with a treecat would be enormous help for future warfare

exiledtoIA wrote:You and I ( for that matter all of us in this thread ) have a huge advantage over everyone in the books.
We know what both sides are doing and thinking.
Elizabeth does not have that advantage.
As for her distrust of Haven,
SARCASM mode enabled:
You are right she should trust the people who murdered her father, her Prime Minister,TRIED to murder her, apparently tried to murder her friend, apparently murdered her ambassador to the Sollies, and oh yes shot their way into power back home.
Sarcasm mode disengaged.

One question:
Who else was supposed to be in the room with Queen Berry?
I'll give you a hint, it was the niece of one of the people going to the peace conference on Torch.
With her past history of having relatives murdered by Haven all of the sudden she is supposed to realize
" Oh wow, They really have changed, the fact that their President was a terrorist before her SECWAR and CNO executed the former government of Haven proves that beyond a doubt."

BAM! I was going to type this kind of response but you have don it already, Thank you ExiledtoIA. We are 3rd person omnicienct, they are first person limited, I think that was what it was called.

drothgery wrote:

namelessfly wrote:Have I mentioned that Rob Pierre is my Havenite hero?

Not so much here. Imposing a murderous police state and throwing the Legislaturalists and their families to mob 'justice', keeping the war with Manticore going even though he thought was a bad idea purely to distract the mob, and not getting serious about economic reform until McQueen took out the most radical parts of the New Paris mob with the Levelers means I have absolutely zero sympathy for Pierre.

Actually, that was not his intention at all. Like I said in my previous post, he wanted to sieze power, fix the economy, eliminate the corruption of the lesilaturist, which he blamed for the death of his son, and get the nation back on track.
The mob was more unwieldy then he predicted. he used them to get power, then had to play to them, so he gacve them the legislaturists. This was why he couldn't get the reforms through, he accidently created a monster in the mob by throwing them the legislatuists and was unable to reach their feeding trough at that time.

I am not saying he would have gave up the power, but he didn't set out to create a reign of terror, it grew from the hexapuma he was trying to ride, and his allies were worrying him. He made deals with the devil to pave the road to hell with all of his good intentions, but we all know what happens to that road...

Commodore Oakius wrote:I am not saying he would have gave up the power, but he didn't set out to create a reign of terror, it grew from the hexapuma he was trying to ride, and his allies were worrying him. He made deals with the devil to pave the road to hell with all of his good intentions, but we all know what happens to that road...

He had the people who killed President Harris killed. Oscar St. Just was his #2 man from the very start. If that wasn't a sign that he was clearly intent on imposing a reign of terror from the very beginning, I don't know what is.

drothgery wrote:

Commodore Oakius wrote:I am not saying he would have gave up the power, but he didn't set out to create a reign of terror, it grew from the hexapuma he was trying to ride, and his allies were worrying him. He made deals with the devil to pave the road to hell with all of his good intentions, but we all know what happens to that road...

He had the people who killed President Harris killed. Oscar St. Just was his #2 man from the very start. If that wasn't a sign that he was clearly intent on imposing a reign of terror from the very beginning, I don't know what is.

To be fair, St. Just was his #2 man because St. Just was already running what became State Security, plus his unswerving loyalty (due to certain personality quirks). No matter what Rob's intentions, such a man would pretty much automatically become #2.

The killing of the assassins (and, for that matter, the method of killing Harris and the top Legislaturalists), are bad signs, though. On the other hand, Pierre isn't the first idealist who thought he could turn things around if he just did a few "necessary" acts and pin the blame elsewhere.

drothgery wrote:He had the people who killed President Harris killed. Oscar St. Just was his #2 man from the very start. If that wasn't a sign that he was clearly intent on imposing a reign of terror from the very beginning, I don't know what is.

But these are not signs of a reign of terror. More signs of efficient, if some what bloodyminded, tidiness. It doesn't show him to be a man to create the reign of terror.
As for Oscar, sure he was a raving paranoiac, but did he ever cross Rob? Never. Never took a action that would contribute to the problems without discussion. He is partially to blame, his advise was problematic for Pierre, but he wasn't the direct cause either, even if he liked it the way it was. Pierre had to restrain him several times in the text.

I maintain Pierre didn't want to create the purges, it says in the text that after the first ones he had to give the mob more so he made more enemies of the people. He didn't want to create a reign of terror, but thats what it was when you didn't know if you were on the next list. I dont think he wanted any of that, he just couldn't see a way to stop it.

If you want to blame someone for the Committee's reign of terror, blame Cordelia Ransom. I really don't think Pierre knew what he was getting into when got involved with her.

Commodore Oakius wrote:I maintain Pierre didn't want to create the purges, it says in the text that after the first ones he had to give the mob more so he made more enemies of the people. He didn't want to create a reign of terror, but thats what it was when you didn't know if you were on the next list. I dont think he wanted any of that, he just couldn't see a way to stop it.

That's the thoughts of someone lying to himself. He embraced a government based on murder and tyranny from the very beginning. If the didn't think that was going to lead to purges, he's nuts.

[quote="exiledtoIA"]You and I ( for that matter all of us in this thread ) have a huge advantage over everyone in the books.
We know what both sides are doing and thinking.
Elizabeth does not have that advantage.
As for her distrust of Haven,
SARCASM mode enabled:
You are right she should trust the people who murdered her father, her Prime Minister,TRIED to murder her, apparently tried to murder her friend, apparently murdered her ambassador to the Sollies, and oh yes shot their way into power back home.
Sarcasm mode disengaged.

One question:
Who else was supposed to be in the room with Queen Berry?
I'll give you a hint, it was the niece of one of the people going to the peace conference on Torch.
With her past history of having relatives murdered by Haven all of the sudden she is supposed to realize
" Oh wow, They really have changed, the fact that their President was a terrorist before her SECWAR and CNO executed the former government of Haven proves that beyond a doubt."



Trust Haven blindly no. Be rational enough to consider the possibility that it might be someone other then Haven behind the attacks yes. She's a leader whenever she can she has a responsibility to think things through before reacting a responsibility she failed to carry out in this case.


Haven case

1: Honor is one of the best officers n the navy of an alliance Haven is at war with.

2: Webster has caused Haven a lot of damage in his time.

3: Haven has no reason to target Berry beyond a theory that Haven wants to ruin the peace talks for some unknown reason.


While Haven had certainly targeted members of Elizabeth's family in the past they were never targeted just for fun, or just because they were members of her family but always targeted because Haven believed that eliminating them would help Haven achieve some goal but attacking Berry only aides Haven if they want the peace talks cancelled and there is no other evidence of them wishing to do so or even a reasonable theory of why they would want to do that.

Manpower case

1: They have a grudge against Honor because of the damage she has caused them, and against her family going back hundreds of years.

2: I'm pretty sure that Webster had caused enough damage to Manpower to give them a grudge against him, though I might be remembering wrong.

3: Manpower definitely had a massive grudge against the leadership of Torch.

And who is more likely to have access to the technology needed to pull this off Manpower or Haven? A genetics engineering conglomerate or a star nation not exactly known for top of the line medical research? I would have put my money on Manpower any day.