Eridani Edict Violation of the most Dismissive Kind...

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.

Several key elements. First, by most measures Manticore and Mesa are at war.That changes the rules more than a bit.

Second,killing assorted thugs is not that big a deal. We see this from some people today. If the good guys aren't perfect, then they are bad guys and it's all right to kill them.

Note that a lot of Mesan weapons, or at least MAlign ones kill a lot of people.

The person you most resemble is Ghandi who criticized the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto uprising for not simply giving in and marching off to the death camps. Killing those poor German SS men was really nasty!

The Mandarins should set up a few anonymous Kew strikes against Earth, killing a lot of civilians and feigning outrage against the troublemaking Manticorans. That will loosen the purse strings along with the necessary support of the population, and its loyalty. As well as vilifying the Manties. Who in the League would think that the Mandarins killed their own?

cthia wrote:The Mandarins should set up a few anonymous Kew strikes against Earth, killing a lot of civilians and feigning outrage against the troublemaking Manticorans. That will loosen the purse strings along with the necessary support of the population, and its loyalty. As well as vilifying the Manties. Who in the League would think that the Mandarins killed their own?

They would not be that stupid. There is no way there wouldn't be a leak and that would destroy them.

The better protagonist for this would be MAlign. Do the job, blame the Manties and let the leadership go nuts. But I would guess they wouldn't do it. They LIKE these Mandarins who don't think outside the box. They've fooled them for centuries.

Damage earth...and I mean the people not the orbital stations, they key one of which is actually orbiting Mars, and someone with talent might take over.

Most likely MAlign would play the game with another planet just to stir the waters. Although they've actually done it with Mesa. That might be the one.

cthia wrote:The Mandarins should set up a few anonymous Kew strikes against Earth, killing a lot of civilians and feigning outrage against the troublemaking Manticorans. That will loosen the purse strings along with the necessary support of the population, and its loyalty. As well as vilifying the Manties. Who in the League would think that the Mandarins killed their own?

The Mandarins aren't that smart. If they were they wouldn't be about to murder a bunch of civies in the next book! If they had played things smart, scouted, gathered some intel after their first defeats and so forth they might be on the edge of victory. Manticore's apparent violation of the EE Edict would rally the League. If they they get Beowulf that's pretty much game over for the Manties.

Oops.

quite possibly a cat wrote:

cthia wrote:The Mandarins should set up a few anonymous Kew strikes against Earth, killing a lot of civilians and feigning outrage against the troublemaking Manticorans. That will loosen the purse strings along with the necessary support of the population, and its loyalty. As well as vilifying the Manties. Who in the League would think that the Mandarins killed their own?

The Mandarins aren't that smart. If they were they wouldn't be about to murder a bunch of civies in the next book! If they had played things smart, scouted, gathered some intel after their first defeats and so forth they might be on the edge of victory. Manticore's apparent violation of the EE Edict would rally the League. If they they get Beowulf that's pretty much game over for the Manties.

Oops.

Smart people can be, and often are, dumb leaders. Remember back to the book "The Best and the Brightest" about how the brilliant folks brought into government by John Kennedy walked us into the VietNam war.

There are always excuses that can be made. Right now, the mandarins are trying for damage control. They don't realize quite yet that they have been betrayed. Keep in mind that Captain Gweon, who is now the guy they're listening to over policy, works for MAlign.

There can be an Eridani violation but I doubt it would raise up anyone much. The core "heart worlds" and some others but many of the worlds on the shell and verge have dealt with the OFS.

And there will be accusations all over the place. In essence, remember that O'Hanrahan describe a violation at Mesa.

My guess is that there will be some form of an armistice. The League will give in because it is breaking up. That will set things up for the next arc taking place 20 years later with a broken League and a Renaissance Association growing stronger.

cthia wrote:The Mandarins should set up a few anonymous Kew strikes against Earth, killing a lot of civilians and feigning outrage against the troublemaking Manticorans. That will loosen the purse strings along with the necessary support of the population, and its loyalty. As well as vilifying the Manties. Who in the League would think that the Mandarins killed their own?

Regarding this notion...

"ldwechsler" says that the Mandarins wouldn't be that stupid.

ldwechsler wrote:They would not be that stupid. There is no way there wouldn't be a leak and that would destroy them.

The better protagonist for this would be MAlign. Do the job, blame the Manties and let the leadership go nuts. But I would guess they wouldn't do it. They LIKE these Mandarins who don't think outside the box. They've fooled them for centuries.

Damage earth...and I mean the people not the orbital stations, they key one of which is actually orbiting Mars, and someone with talent might take over.

Most likely MAlign would play the game with another planet just to stir the waters. Although they've actually done it with Mesa. That might be the one.

"quite possibly a cat" says the Mandarins aren't that smart.

quite possibly a cat wrote:The Mandarins aren't that smart. If they were they wouldn't be about to murder a bunch of civies in the next book! If they had played things smart, scouted, gathered some intel after their first defeats and so forth they might be on the edge of victory. Manticore's apparent violation of the EE Edict would rally the League. If they they get Beowulf that's pretty much game over for the Manties.

Oops.

The truth probably lies somewhere in the middle.

Moreover, are they desperate enough? The Mandarins are their own inner onion. Following the premise of this thread, if they can arrange for certain key positions of power to all assemble for some meeting of minds and somehow arrange their own Kew strike taking them out, then naturally feign outrage at the appalling Manticoran strike, then they could temporarily assume total emergency power. And they now control the power of the purse and any other power that they foresaw they needed by ensuring that the holder of that position was also present. They could make sure that they are late to the party because of some prearranged official matters requiring a meeting of the Mandarin minds.

The offending SLN vessel that carried out the strike could be set up, eliminated. I wonder if Foraker's tactic of frying a ship with a few commands arranged ahead of time could work for the Mandarins? The Mandarins are desperate and they are not going to go quietly in the night.

We have a snippet that appears to be two SLN officers talking about strikes against a non-SLN system which is withing the SL sphere of control as some combination of punishment and warning about dealing with Manticore and supporting Beowulf.
Setting up system as an example of not toeing the SL/Mandarin line would seem to be just what the Alignment would want to provoke the Mandarins & SLN into as another way to break the League.

Brigade XO wrote:We have a snippet that appears to be two SLN officers talking about strikes against a non-SLN system which is withing the SL sphere of control as some combination of punishment and warning about dealing with Manticore and supporting Beowulf.
Setting up system as an example of not toeing the SL/Mandarin line would seem to be just what the Alignment would want to provoke the Mandarins & SLN into as another way to break the League.

Exactly. Remember that the real basic goal of MAlign is to shatter the League. They might hate Manticore and Harrington but the 500 year goal is to take down the system the controls genetic engineering.

Planets don't have to be totally on their own. There will probably be more than a few groupings. But a small group of important people is easier to influence that a real lot of folk scattered over more than a thousand planets.

MAlign is working hard to make the Manticorans look bad but they are the ones who got Byng, Crandall and Filareta in place and set the mandarins up for disaster.

I predict that somewhere in UH the mandarins will find out how badly they've been infiltrated.

Paradigm shift in the Manticore Binary System?


You are looking at an oscillator found here ...



It reminds me of the SEM—Manticore, Sphinx and Gryphon. Think of the center square as representing Manticore, situated at the MWJ. As each period passes by, the Manticore system is stable, but Sphinx and Gryphon changes (as is the spoils of war).

"Gall-lee Sarge," Conway's Game of Life suggests, as well as predicts, many results, as well as supporting still others. And it guarantees that it will inspire much much more.

One other thing that the Game of Life suggests, even predicts, is a possible death, or the inevitable coalescing of certain systems in the Honorverse.

Hearken back to the premise of this thread. The Malign has orchestrated the most successful EEV strike in history against Manticore, and has left it politically devastated. Would the dominant local system government of the Manticore Binary system become Sphinx or Gryphon? Should it?

After all, the government that is left on Manticore is being run by Aldermen, City Council members and dog catchers.

Does this tragedy not make Manticore a weaker local government?

cthia wrote:Paradigm shift in the Manticore Binary System?


You are looking at an oscillator found here ...



It reminds me of the SEM—Manticore, Sphinx and Gryphon. Think of the center square as representing Manticore, situated at the MWJ. As each period passes by, the Manticore system is stable, but Sphinx and Gryphon changes (as is the spoils of war).

"Gall-lee Sarge," Conway's Game of Life suggests, as well as predicts, many results, as well as supporting still others. And it guarantees that it will inspire much much more.

One other thing that the Game of Life suggests, even predicts, is a possible death, or the inevitable coalescing of certain systems in the Honorverse.

Hearken back to the premise of this thread. The Malign has orchestrated the most successful EEV strike in history against Manticore, and has left it politically devastated. Would the dominant local system government of the Manticore Binary system become Sphinx or Gryphon? Should it?

After all, the government that is left on Manticore is being run by Aldermen, City Council members and dog catchers.

Does this tragedy not make Manticore a weaker local government?

Several facts are just wrong. Manticore was not politically devastated. The government continued. Also, all three planets were hit. Why should Sphynx, for example, become dominant?

The top leaders were still in place. Yes, a lot of people died. But the government continued. And sometime thereafter made a major alliance with its old enemy Haven and the two nations shattered a major Sollie fleet.