The Complacency of the White Haven Admiralty (Spoilers)

noblehunter wrote:I don't actually buy that the Mandarins could have leveraged Houdini's finale into a quick and dirty constitutional amendment.
It'd be like the American Federal government trying to take direct control of state finances. No matter how dangerous the situation, it's too contrary to basic assumptions about the relationship between State and Federal governments. Not to mention I think it'd be difficult to convince people to generalize from nuking Mesa to nuking anywhere.

Sure maybe. Or maybe we take a look at the text. For example Daud al Fanudahis musings:

The public boards were full of stories— some from accredited newsies; most anonymously sourced— about a new amendment to the Constitution, one designed to solve the League’s current fiscal crisis.
Given the atmosphere here in the Sol System, the amendment— if it existed, and he thought it probably did— would sail through the rumored truncated ratification process in a heartbeat, despite any legal flaws in the procedure. And if the Mandarins were able to tap however deeply they needed to into the enormous economic power of the League, the situation would change radically. The probability of the League’s collapse— or, at least, the collapse of its Federal government, which might possibly have restored sanity to its foreign policy— would decrease significantly, and the Grand Alliance would know it was looking at a much longer, much more dangerous conflict.

Star Knight wrote:Sure maybe. Or maybe we take a look at the text. For example Daud al Fanudahis musings:

The public boards were full of stories— some from accredited newsies; most anonymously sourced— about a new amendment to the Constitution, one designed to solve the League’s current fiscal crisis.
Given the atmosphere here in the Sol System, the amendment— if it existed, and he thought it probably did— would sail through the rumored truncated ratification process in a heartbeat, despite any legal flaws in the procedure. And if the Mandarins were able to tap however deeply they needed to into the enormous economic power of the League, the situation would change radically. The probability of the League’s collapse— or, at least, the collapse of its Federal government, which might possibly have restored sanity to its foreign policy— would decrease significantly, and the Grand Alliance would know it was looking at a much longer, much more dangerous conflict.

That would be the authorial fiat, yes.

I dont think we know enough about the power balance in the assembly to make that claim stick.

noblehunter wrote:The GA's strategy was working pretty well until Mesa got nuked. The League was months away from collapsing in economic and constitutional turmoil. Whatever improvements the League made in the meantime would amount to very little.

I don't actually buy that the Mandarins could have leveraged Houdini's finale into a quick and dirty constitutional amendment. It'd be like the American Federal government trying to take direct control of state finances. No matter how dangerous the situation, it's too contrary to basic assumptions about the relationship between State and Federal governments. Not to mention I think it'd be difficult to convince people to generalize from nuking Mesa to nuking anywhere.

The League was beaten when it became clear they couldn't reverse Lacoon. In my opinion, it was authorial fiat that gave them a chance to avoid it by changing the Constitution.

Well... It was only logical that they would go that route since the Mandarins had more or less ignored the inconvenient parts of the constitution for a very very long time and now they could wave the Manty boogeyman in front of the members to push through the legislation they wanted.

So I'm not sure I would really classify it as an authorial fiat.

Joat42 wrote:Well... It was only logical that they would go that route since the Mandarins had more or less ignored the inconvenient parts of the constitution for a very very long time and now they could wave the Manty boogeyman in front of the members to push through the legislation they wanted.

So I'm not sure I would really classify it as an authorial fiat.

I'm thinking that its the sort of thing that the Mandarins have been doing all along: they think it will make things better, but it actually won't, because pretty much every single system would have looked at the Mandarins and said "This is illegal!" and refused to collect any of the tax for them. It's their inside-the-bubble thinking coming home to roost.

Joat42 wrote:Well... It was only logical that they would go that route since the Mandarins had more or less ignored the inconvenient parts of the constitution for a very very long time and now they could wave the Manty boogeyman in front of the members to push through the legislation they wanted.

So I'm not sure I would really classify it as an authorial fiat.

I think there's a difference between ignoring the constitution and re-writing it. Just ask the Keys.

What the Mandarins were trying was just as much of an existential threat to the League as anything the MA or GA were doing. I don't think people would have missed that. It may be based more on what I think about the League than what's actually in the text but it's still how I reacted to the book.

The point relative to the OP is that the GA's strategy was working and would have been successful except the MA was meddling.

tonyz wrote:I'm thinking that its the sort of thing that the Mandarins have been doing all along: they think it will make things better, but it actually won't, because pretty much every single system would have looked at the Mandarins and said "This is illegal!" and refused to collect any of the tax for them. It's their inside-the-bubble thinking coming home to roost.

Even just taxing the Sol system's economy directly would have kept the Federal government afloat. It would have made things extraordinarily messy outside the Kuiper but that would be a problem for tomorrow's Mandarins.

Joat42 wrote:[
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Well... It was only logical that they would go that route since the Mandarins had more or less ignored the inconvenient parts of the constitution for a very very long time and now they could wave the Manty boogeyman in front of the members to push through the legislation they wanted.

So I'm not sure I would really classify it as an authorial fiat.

I had predicted that they would simply find a way to directly tax the core. I didn’t predict an amendment, but it’s all the same.

noblehunter wrote:Even just taxing the Sol system's economy directly would have kept the Federal government afloat. It would have made things extraordinarily messy outside the Kuiper but that would be a problem for tomorrow's Mandarins.

Unless the Mandarins were planning immediate retirement then nope. Implementing taxation wasn't going to happen overnight or without significant opposition. Even the beginning of having the prerequisites for military results - aka building wallers that can stand up to the GA would be approximately two years away.

On the other hand mucking around with the Constitution would drastically piss off most League planetary governments the exact moment the courier informing them of said changes being considered arrived.

Remember the flood of systems, including Core Worlds that were considering saying 'Good bye and good luck' after Beowulf got out?

Direct taxation without scrupulously respecting every single procedure was going to be at least ten times bigger and it was something the GA could very much exploit. If half of the League leaves it and the GA scoop off the Protectorates the Mandarins are going to rapidly find themselves out of a job - after all they've just screwed both the transtellars and the League planetary governments.

Slneezy wrote:Unless the Mandarins were planning immediate retirement then nope. Implementing taxation wasn't going to happen overnight or without significant opposition. Even the beginning of having the prerequisites for military results - aka building wallers that can stand up to the GA would be approximately two years away.

On the other hand mucking around with the Constitution would drastically piss off most League planetary governments the exact moment the courier informing them of said changes being considered arrived.

Remember the flood of systems, including Core Worlds that were considering saying 'Good bye and good luck' after Beowulf got out?

Direct taxation without scrupulously respecting every single procedure was going to be at least ten times bigger and it was something the GA could very much exploit. If half of the League leaves it and the GA scoop off the Protectorates the Mandarins are going to rapidly find themselves out of a job - after all they've just screwed both the transtellars and the League planetary governments.

It'd be a total mess but the League would last longer than it would without direct taxation. It'd buy them the two years they'd need to build new ships. If the GA took out the shipyards, it might quell the Core's objection to taxation.

noblehunter wrote:It'd be a total mess but the League would last longer than it would without direct taxation. It'd buy them the two years they'd need to build new ships. If the GA took out the shipyards, it might quell the Core's objection to taxation.

Yeah, find a nation that abandoned an existential war and surrendered because the couldn’t fit it in the budget. They may destroy the economy and creat huge problems to be dealt with “later” but it just doesn’t happen.