As the readers, we intialy Silesia as already a Confederation with a central governing body and navy but ...and it's a big BUT....it had and probably for centuries had existing problems that the Confederation could't handle. Primarily it was corrupt government officials (at all sorts of levels) and active partnerships with various criminal organizations. What we were shown was that interplay with pirates with various System and Confed people providing support for pirates by acting as fences for goods/ships, safe baseing and logistics and not hunting them down. That would be 1st not actualy looking for them and 2nd not telling anybody where they were or doing much more than saying they were trying to eliminate pirates.
There were indepent Systems in Silesia, up to multi-system polities. There were also massive political and other problems such as Warnike (spelling). The Confederation Navy and the local SDFs were ineffective is dealing with these problems. Part of that was the connivance of various officials (at various levels) blocking the attempts to deal with the problems and part was the Confed Navy never apperas to have gotten it's act together.
There were systems where the governments were honest. There were (probably a lot) of Confed people who where honest and doing their jobs. But the whole thing was flawed with the corruption and crime. We seem to believe that the Alignment had something to do with that and it may be correct.
What we also were shown was that Manticore and at least the Andermani were ACTIVLY sending warships there for commerce protection for their own merchant shipping- and, of course, taking any pirate they encountered.
That would be one variation of the GA getting involved in what boils down to commerce protection in the areas around the new version of the SL in it's revised size and not being required (under thread of the ships being destroyed on sight) to stay out of anyplace not relative to the space of actual League Members. That would be in the Verge, anywhere in the "frontier" and the space of any system that opted to leave the League.
I have said before: The GA and it's member Star Nations are going to continue to need to develope new people (and tech) and maintain their Navy's experience and competence in dealing with warfare in the Honorverse. Pirate hunting does help with that and you also are going to be using ships out doing that patroling as testbeds for new tech and upgrades and evovling tactics.
Commerce protection is NOT a waste of money. It keeps you from loosing parts of that vast economic engine that is your (and your treaty partners) merchant fleets. It also provides live fire and realtime experience in doing their jobs and at least maintaining the skills and proficiency of our Navy.
How can you also not think at, beyond the Alignment and the RF doing what they can to mess things up for the GA and relative peace, there are going to be any number of people who will be upset about the loss of their power, income and ability to do what they want with the changes forced on the Leage plus just plain old wish for revenge. So, there will be a need for a powerful, evefective and evolving naval ability on the part of the GA and it's component Star Nations. The Andermani can also be uncomfortable neighbors (they do want to grow) so the whole idea of peace through strength does apply, even of relations do remain more or less cordial.
