Yawata strike

fallsfromtrees wrote:Yes, but how many of the computer records got destroyed, accidentally or deliberately during not one, not two but three uprisings/changes of government. (St Just taking over from Pierre counts as a change of government.)

fallsfromtrees wrote:Yes, but how many of the computer records got destroyed, accidentally or deliberately during not one, not two but three uprisings/changes of government. (St Just taking over from Pierre counts as a change of government.)

kzt wrote:

fallsfromtrees wrote:Yes, but how many of the computer records got destroyed, accidentally or deliberately during not one, not two but three uprisings/changes of government. (St Just taking over from Pierre counts as a change of government.)

In addition - if MA agents were essentially running the government for decades, why do you think you can trust the records of the government to show anything interesting about MA agents?

kzt wrote:Plus, how the heck are you going to do that? So I know someone immigrated here 150 years ago. In the US that would be 1865. President Herbert Hoover's mother was an immigrant about that time, so obviously his great grand kids are spies because?

fallsfromtrees wrote:Yes, but how many of the computer records got destroyed, accidentally or deliberately during not one, not two but three uprisings/changes of government. (St Just taking over from Pierre counts as a change of government.)

kzt wrote:In addition - if MA agents were essentially running the government for decades, why do you think you can trust the records of the government to show anything interesting about MA agents?

JeffEngel wrote:They had to make choices about whether to conceal something that might, down the road, with hindsight they would be doing their level best to be sure no one ever had, look suspicious, versus doctoring records in a way that may look suspicious to anyone who comes across it any time without having beforehand any specific cause for concern.

So being an open immigrant - Haven traditionally had lots back when, as the Athens of the Stars - with a family history of service, honor and ambition wouldn't be the sort of thing they would have wanted to try to conceal, then. Downplay, perhaps, less for security against someone looking for Alignment agents than for fitting in and charming modesty. But not create a possible red flag by fabricating a false history there on Haven.

fallsfromtrees wrote:Pritchart's point is that they can't be buried so deeply that there was no communication link, and it is the evidence of that link that they are going to be looking for. Of course, with the treecats coming, all you have to do is ask someone you are looking at "What do you know about the Mesa Alignment?" and Ignatz treecat checks for the emotional shock/reaction to the question. If you are looking for a better reaction ask "How long have you been working for Mesa and/or the Mesa Alignment?". Even with a smooth denial, the emotional reaction should be a flare lit tipoff.

SWM wrote:

fallsfromtrees wrote:Pritchart's point is that they can't be buried so deeply that there was no communication link, and it is the evidence of that link that they are going to be looking for. Of course, with the treecats coming, all you have to do is ask someone you are looking at "What do you know about the Mesa Alignment?" and Ignatz treecat checks for the emotional shock/reaction to the question. If you are looking for a better reaction ask "How long have you been working for Mesa and/or the Mesa Alignment?". Even with a smooth denial, the emotional reaction should be a flare lit tipoff.

That might catch actual Alignment deep agents. But I hope they use a somewhat broader approach, to catch people who are working for somebody but don't know it is the Alignment and have never heard of them before.

StealthSeeker wrote:

kzt wrote:Plus, how the heck are you going to do that? So I know someone immigrated here 150 years ago. In the US that would be 1865. President Herbert Hoover's mother was an immigrant about that time, so obviously his great grand kids are spies because?

But in 1865, we, the U.S., was a "neobarb" country so backward that they had never herd of a little thing called computers. Not so in the Honerverse.

Bill Woods wrote: I don't see how the Andermani could beat Henke. She left from Talbott Quad as soon as she knew the outcome of 2nd Manticore, with only a delay of about three weeks at Meyer System. Unless the Andies took the wormhole to Lynx and cut off the dogleg, how could they possibly get to Mesa first?
And, at the end of Cauldron, how would Honor not know about their ETA? And yet she only tells Zilwicki about Henke.

George J. Smith wrote:Unless they went from Trevor's Star via the MWJ to Beowulf then hopped across to Visigoth and took the wormhole to Mesa.

Bill Woods wrote:But then they wouldn't be taking the people on Mesa by surprise. And again, Honor would know, and be telling Zilwicki about them.

fallsfromtrees wrote: All supposition. We don't know how long Henke was at Meyers. Certainly long enough for considerable progress to be made in cracking open various individuals files, and we don't know how long it took her to go from Tillerman? to Meyers - should be only a week or two, but we don't know. The only firm date in the book is August, 1922, and that is before she decides to move on Meyers. While it is a reasonable assumption that Henke is the one who showed up at the end of CoG, we won't know until David writes the next book, and I suspect that he's not telling, if only to keep his options open, if a sudden brilliant idea should occur to him, taking him in a new direction.

Bill Woods wrote:We do know, pretty nearly:
Henke received news of 2nd Manticore about 3.5 weeks after it happened ("eight days"{ch.5} + "just over two weeks"{ch.29}) and left Tillerman for Meyers about two days later{ch.29}. Ch.30 is the first chapter in July.
She arrived in ch.33, which is the first chapter in August. "[O]ver two weeks" later{ch.35} she and Lecter discuss interrogating Hongbo, which she does in the next chapter. "[S]everal hours later" she decides to leave for Mesa, and does so "a couple of days" later{ch.36}.
So her total time at Meyers is about 3 weeks, leaving in late August (or perhaps early September).
I don't know the flight time from Meyers to Mesa, but from New Tuscany it's "the next best thing to forty-five T-days" by conventional dispatch boat{MoH,ch.4}. New Tuscany's on the far side of the Talbott Quad, so from Meyers, about a month?

Joat42 wrote:snip for brevity
I have an unlikely idea what force showed up at Mesa, the Mannerheim SDF. It's convoluted enough and it means that MAlign can keep overt control of Mesa through Mannerheim.