The Misalignment of MA plans?

The GA will also be a cultural and political center that will resist any attempt to change the general attitudes towards genetic engineering. They also pose a non-zero threat to the stability of the RF as spheres of influence come into conflict. I think the plan was for the RF to expand more or less peacefully as it turned into a true successor of the League. But unless something truly unfortunate happens to the GA, the post-League galaxy will be truly multi-polar. That doesn't bode well from trying to uplift the whole human race.

Kytheros wrote:

JohnRoth wrote:
The other nit is whether Manticore and Haven between themselves could squash the chaos after the SL breaks up. I seriously doubt it. They're sitting on the periphery of the settled part of the spiral arm, and they're not really in position, let alone interested, in becoming the next Galactic Empire.

As far as that goes ... they're not interested in becoming a megastate, but with the wormhole network, and especially Manticore's place in it, I expect that they could do a reasonably good job at peacekeeping and supporting/maintaining order over a fairly large chunk of space. The wormholes make their realspace location a lot less relevant, what matters more is the locations of the wormhole termini.

I don't think they want to be the next Galactic Umpire either.

welcome to the world of Unintended Consequences.

[hmmm... I'll bet there's a planet or system out there with that name. be an interesting side story.]

JohnRoth wrote:

Kytheros wrote:As far as that goes ... they're not interested in becoming a megastate, but with the wormhole network, and especially Manticore's place in it, I expect that they could do a reasonably good job at peacekeeping and supporting/maintaining order over a fairly large chunk of space. The wormholes make their realspace location a lot less relevant, what matters more is the locations of the wormhole termini.

I don't think they want to be the next Galactic Umpire either.

Kytheros wrote:

JohnRoth wrote:
The other nit is whether Manticore and Haven between themselves could squash the chaos after the SL breaks up. I seriously doubt it. They're sitting on the periphery of the settled part of the spiral arm, and they're not really in position, let alone interested, in becoming the next Galactic Empire.

As far as that goes ... they're not interested in becoming a megastate, but with the wormhole network, and especially Manticore's place in it, I expect that they could do a reasonably good job at peacekeeping and supporting/maintaining order over a fairly large chunk of space. The wormholes make their realspace location a lot less relevant, what matters more is the locations of the wormhole termini.

Good point, but a thought question.... Does Manticore/the GA have any choice other than to become a megastate of equals? Consider what happens (Obama-foreign policy anyone?) when the 800lb gorilla simply takes their toys and decides to go home. Or when the politicos (High Ridge's ilk) refuse to let the honorable among the 800lb gorilla's forces do their jobs and set up integritable and transparent, human-rights defending systems before they leave.

Anyway, if I were an author trying to finish the main story in two books, I don't think I'd even touch that conundrum, and say what you may about the long wait for the next book or books, RFC gets it about current history and "future HonorVerse" application of the lessons.

Even under the best case scenario Honors Great Grandchildren will still be dealing with the fallout of the current events.

Jonathan_S wrote:

cthia wrote:Something that isn't quite clear to me. The RF has sleepers, yes. Do they also have sleeping star nations of the League ready to separate and join them because of well placed powerful mouthpieces and sleeping officials?

IOW, do they already have a core of secret League member states as seemed to be inferred by the wiki? Supporting textev?

Yes, they absolutely do, and I think Potato's right and its covered in Mission of Honor.

There's a scene where Detwiller meets with the heads of (IIRC) 12 star systems that are all Star Line. The whole point of the RF is that those 12 (?) MAlign infiltrated systems will be the nucleus of stability for the remnants of the shattered League to coalesce around; then they'll publicly band their disparate groups together into the (public) Renascence Faction.
That's how the MAlign plans to end up in control of the majority of the League's current worlds. The MAlign spent probably a couple centuries working behind the scenes to get their chosen families deep into the political power structure of those worlds, so that people fairly far inside the onion would be in effective control when the crisis was engineered to shatter the League.

What happens when many of the citizens of these sleeper states don't want anything to do with the new direction of the planet and want off? Will they be "stuck like Chuck" on the wrong side of the demarcation line like many families separated by the Berlin Wall? Or will Detweiler happily let them go?

I suppose Beowulf could have that same dilemma of a mass of fleeing people "causing" an exodus. What will that do to the local economy?

cthia wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:There's a scene where Detwiller meets with the heads of (IIRC) 12 star systems that are all Star Line. The whole point of the RF is that those 12 (?) MAlign infiltrated systems will be the nucleus of stability for the remnants of the shattered League to coalesce around; then they'll publicly band their disparate groups together into the (public) Renascence Faction.
That's how the MAlign plans to end up in control of the majority of the League's current worlds. The MAlign spent probably a couple centuries working behind the scenes to get their chosen families deep into the political power structure of those worlds, so that people fairly far inside the onion would be in effective control when the crisis was engineered to shatter the League.

What happens when many of the citizens of these sleeper states don't want anything to do with the new direction of the planet and want off? Will they be "stuck like Chuck" on the wrong side of the demarcation line like many families separated by the Berlin Wall? Or will Detweiler happily let them go?

I suppose Beowulf could have that same dilemma of a mass of fleeing people "causing" an exodus. What will that do to the local economy?

We don't actually know. But I'd bet (unless thing went way off the rails) that they'd be free to go. The RF is the honey trap, supposed to lure in nearby systems by offering security and stability amid the chaos of the League breakup. Going all iron curtain on their citizens is likely to come to the attention of the systems their supposed to be convincing to join and follow them; and would work at cross purposes to that plan.

OTOH those same RF systems have some of the larger SDFs in the League, and I'm sure their MAlign infiltrated government wouldn't be above pushing the news outlets to play up how unsafe the rest of League space is becoming post shattering. So an unhappy citizen would be running from real safety; that's going to weigh the scales against fleeing. (And if course those systems are supposed to be trying to avoid scaring people and other systems away, and instead be attracting them. So probably no abrupt institution of scary policies)

cthia wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:There's a scene where Detwiller meets with the heads of (IIRC) 12 star systems that are all Star Line. The whole point of the RF is that those 12 (?) MAlign infiltrated systems will be the nucleus of stability for the remnants of the shattered League to coalesce around; then they'll publicly band their disparate groups together into the (public) Renascence Faction.
That's how the MAlign plans to end up in control of the majority of the League's current worlds. The MAlign spent probably a couple centuries working behind the scenes to get their chosen families deep into the political power structure of those worlds, so that people fairly far inside the onion would be in effective control when the crisis was engineered to shatter the League.

What happens when many of the citizens of these sleeper states don't want anything to do with the new direction of the planet and want off? Will they be "stuck like Chuck" on the wrong side of the demarcation line like many families separated by the Berlin Wall? Or will Detweiler happily let them go?

I suppose Beowulf could have that same dilemma of a mass of fleeing people "causing" an exodus. What will that do to the local economy?

Jonathan_S wrote:We don't actually know. But I'd bet (unless thing went way off the rails) that they'd be free to go. The RF is the honey trap, supposed to lure in nearby systems by offering security and stability amid the chaos of the League breakup. Going all iron curtain on their citizens is likely to come to the attention of the systems their supposed to be convincing to join and follow them; and would work at cross purposes to that plan.

OTOH those same RF systems have some of the larger SDFs in the League, and I'm sure their MAlign infiltrated government wouldn't be above pushing the news outlets to play up how unsafe the rest of League space is becoming post shattering. So an unhappy citizen would be running from real safety; that's going to weigh the scales against fleeing. (And if course those systems are supposed to be trying to avoid scaring people and other systems away, and instead be attracting them. So probably no abrupt institution of scary policies)

I'm just willing to bet that the RF worlds will be throwing some clandestine heat, thus starting all sorts of troubling fires in the other systems, as proof that they need RF firemen to protect them. They just wouldn't know that the culprits are RF sponsored in many instances.

Remind you of any era?

cthia wrote:I'm just willing to bet that the RF worlds will be throwing some clandestine heat, thus starting all sorts of troubling fires in the other systems, as proof that they need RF firemen to protect them. They just wouldn't know that the culprits are RF sponsored in many instances.

Remind you of any era?

Pretty much all of human history.

pnakasone wrote:

cthia wrote:I'm just willing to bet that the RF worlds will be throwing some clandestine heat, thus starting all sorts of troubling fires in the other systems, as proof that they need RF firemen to protect them. They just wouldn't know that the culprits are RF sponsored in many instances.

Remind you of any era?

Pretty much all of human history.

Good quotes both. Away from my set of books at present, but wasn't a statement in one of the RF discussions scenes that the MAlign thought that they might have to use --shall we say -- shady directed encouragement if not actual "remove the leaders in charge even if they are RF" if some of those folks got cold feet when the penny drops -- aka a systemic "plato o pomo" [silver or lead] proposition?