Star Knight wrote:
I do think though, that the entire Hypatia, Buccaneer, Beowulf situation doesn’t really provide a sufficiently “spectacular justification” for attacking SOL and getting away with it. Or to put it another way, I would say that long term there would be little to no difference if Operation Nemesis had happened immediately after Second Manticore instead off after Beowulf. And sometimes its better to just rip the bandaid off, instead of waiting for the power of plot to breed a better circumstance. Could have gone wrong too after all.
Beowulf is kind of second after Sol by sheer reputation. At any rate it is a particularly prosperous founding member of the League and the place that got humanity prolong - not some neobarb system in the back of nowhere.
The League federal government apparently ignoring its most sacred rules against Beowulf and then the GA acting with utmost restraint... yeah, that's the sort of thing that strikes a note.
After Second Manticore Manticore would have come off as a hostile power to be defeated at all costs no matter what even if the League was in the wrong since Manticore is a distant and hostile power. By contrast the people of Beowulf are fellow core worlders so the Mandarins moving against them is the sort of thing that would piss off other core worlds.