Eridani Edict Violation of the most Dismissive Kind...

Bluesqueak wrote:So, basically, you're insisting they're responsible for what other people did. They didn't steal the nuke, they didn't want to use nukes in place of smaller explosives, they didn't want David Pritchard in charge of the nuke - and the only way they could have stopped any of that would be either by leaving the locator beacon running so that they all got caught, or by killing Pritchard when he hadn't actually done anything crazy ...

They disabled the locator beacon. Those are there for a reason. They assisted the terrorists. They could have confiscated the nuke, or disabled the nuke. You don't get to help terrorists steal a nuke and then be innocent when they murder a bunch of children.

Bluesqueak wrote:And as Kzt just pointed out, it's going to be awfully difficult to keep the activities of Thandi, Victor and Yana secret. They're now planetary grade heroes amongst the Seccies (and quite possibly among the slaves).

Yeah. That's really bad. They were murdering civilians. Not just Green Pines, but they intentionally assisted in and committed themselves the murder of numerous members of Mesa's police forces. Those were civilians. Not soldiers. If the GA is caught murdering civilians they'll be suspect number one for murdering civilians.

Bluesqueak wrote:In addition, Mesa's bio-weapon can't make someone confess to something; it relies on muscle memory, not reprogramming the brain. They could make Rajani commit suicide - the movements were relatively simple. But they couldn't make him write a suicide note. Or dictate a last message.

We haven't gotten clear limits. For example they had a more complex version for attacking Torch. Hell, they could flat out use something more like Adjustment which can allow for much more complex activities.

And even if that's beyond their capabilities they CAN fabricate sensor readings. It is entirely possible the sensor logs of one or more ground facilities shows Manticore firing stealth air-to-ground missiles.

Bluesqueak wrote:
A situation where no-one has any idea that there's a generations long secret conspiracy of genetic supervillains, some of whom are also part of a generations long 'sleeper agent' conspiracy - is quite different from a situation where people know there's such a conspiracy and are actively looking for it.

What criteria are they going to be looking for? You can't just pick "genetic supervillains". If you try that you'll likely declare war on someplace like Meyerdahl, where the people apparently have superpowers. (Highly limited psychic empathic ability at least in Beta Meyerdahl First Wave.)

Bluesqueak wrote:But the textev is there; the Mesan Alignment is having the same problems you get with any breeding programme that uses linebreeding. As they reduce genetic diversity, the various lines display the wanted characteristics, but also display an increased amount of unwanted characteristics.

Actually, all genetic intelligence boosts in Honorverse seem to create mental instability and increased aggression. Honor Harrington would have been in serious trouble if Houseman had been able to press charges. Scrags appear to be extremely aggressive despite not having any sort of controlled breed program. I suppose the pleasure lines don't show that problem, but they were never intended to have boosted intelligence in the first place!

Regardless, they have billions of people on Darius and access to what I'm sure are massive databases of possible genetics. Such problems can now be eliminated.

Quite Possibly A Cat:

Ah. It took me some time to realise that you're doing some weird 'alternative reading' in which the Mesan Alignment are the real heroes.

Of course, that does and will involve ignoring one heck of a lot of textev, because this is a series by David Weber, not a dystopia by S.M. Stirling.

Bluesqueak wrote:Quite Possibly A Cat:

Ah. It took me some time to realise that you're doing some weird 'alternative reading' in which the Mesan Alignment are the real heroes.

Of course, that does and will involve ignoring one heck of a lot of textev, because this is a series by David Weber, not a dystopia by S.M. Stirling.

Naw. The Mesan leadership are baddies. The sides aren't arranged into good guys and bad guys.

The real hero is of course DeKyper.

quite possibly a cat wrote:

Bluesqueak wrote:Naw. The Mesan leadership are baddies. The sides aren't arranged into good guys and bad guys.

The real hero is of course DeKyper.

Everyone is the hero in their own story.

https://youtu.be/8JOpPNra4bw

kzt wrote:Everyone is the hero in their own story.

I'm pretty sure Weber writes this way. The POV characters always seem a lot more sympathetic because of it. Its how we end up with Firebrand seeming like a sympathetic character!

quite possibly a cat wrote:Naw. The Mesan leadership are baddies. The sides aren't arranged into good guys and bad guys.

The real hero is of course DeKyper.

Good stuff.

Now, regarding:

quite possibly a cat wrote:they intentionally assisted in and committed themselves the murder of numerous members of Mesa's police forces. Those were civilians. Not soldiers. If the GA is caught murdering civilians they'll be suspect number one for murdering civilians.

I suggest you go back and re-read Chapters 57 and 59 of Cauldron of Ghosts. Because you seem a little confused about the nature of Mesa's 'police' forces. And deeply confused about exactly who was murdering whom.

Bluesqueak wrote:I suggest you go back and re-read Chapters 57 and 59 of Cauldron of Ghosts. Because you seem a little confused about the nature of Mesa's 'police' forces. And deeply confused about exactly who was murdering whom.

While St. Peter might approve of Victor and Anton's actions with regards to the Mesan police forces, it doesn't change change the fact that ultimately, Anton and Victor and Thandi sneaked into Mesa by posing as civilians and then went on to kill civilians. The accepted rules of war don't have a "Its okay because they were bad civilians" exception. In fact, its nearly the opposite; the rules of war allow you to bombard your own people.

Regardless, Manticore wants to show it would never, ever target civilians with its military. Getting caught killing civilians blows that up. Also there was the incident where the Manticorian weapons mowed down a couple of Mesan police officers randomly.

Which brings me to another point: Manticore is getting framed. There will probably be sensor records showing Manticore firing stealthy missiles at the targets.

quite possibly a cat wrote:
Which brings me to another point: Manticore is getting framed. There will probably be sensor records showing Manticore firing stealthy missiles at the targets.

Framed is such a loaded word. I believe liberals call this being “truthy”.

IIRC it was the Mesan authorities that attacked the seccies after the explosions initiated by the Malign started, so in effect the killings by Victor et al were all in self defence. What were they supposed to do just stand there and be shot?

quite possibly a cat wrote:

Bluesqueak wrote:I suggest you go back and re-read Chapters 57 and 59 of Cauldron of Ghosts. Because you seem a little confused about the nature of Mesa's 'police' forces. And deeply confused about exactly who was murdering whom.

While St. Peter might approve of Victor and Anton's actions with regards to the Mesan police forces, it doesn't change change the fact that ultimately, Anton and Victor and Thandi sneaked into Mesa by posing as civilians and then went on to kill civilians. The accepted rules of war don't have a "Its okay because they were bad civilians" exception. In fact, its nearly the opposite; the rules of war allow you to bombard your own people.

Regardless, Manticore wants to show it would never, ever target civilians with its military. Getting caught killing civilians blows that up. Also there was the incident where the Manticorian weapons mowed down a couple of Mesan police officers randomly.

Which brings me to another point: Manticore is getting framed. There will probably be sensor records showing Manticore firing stealthy missiles at the targets.

Killed civilians. No. Government forces who carry guns are part of the military as targets, no matter what their titles are. They may be army, or state police, or Federal Turkey Inspectors*, but if they are authorized to use force and carry weapons they are the same as everyone else who is authorized to use force and carry weapons.

*No, I did not make up "Federal Turkey Inspectors". Ours are indeed authorized to carry weapons, and given certain quaint job hazards it is a good thing, too.