Intergalactic Summit

You keep saying that and I don't know why.

All I am saying is that you are making some pretty huge and outlandish claims - I'm just asking for SOMETHING to back them up. I want some MEAT to discuss, not just proclamations of doubtful veracity and dubious provenance. You've made some pretty sweeping statements here and I'm not seeing anything in them that makes me confident that you know what you're talking about.

Take your attempt at amateur psycho-analysation of me, for example. You're assuming things about my motivations that aren't true, you're assuming things about the Caldari per se that aren't true and you're assuming things about my private life that also aren't true. This does not fill me with confidence in your predictions.

There. I've hopefully satisfied YOUR curiosity, how about you throw ME a bone?

Erm, you do realize the Gal stands for Galactic right? I know we kinda invented the whole FTL communications thing, but even we wouldn't be arrogant enough to have the official name of the public communications network for all in the cluster to be called Gallente Network. Whatever...



Look, many of the things you claim are simply incorrect. There is no debate about it. A war with no resources? Impossible. A war with limited resources? Okay now we can start talking. Yet you vehemently insist the former which is impossible. Then you generalize the Gallente as cowardly and ignorant people who don't know how to fight. Which is a wild exaggeration, if not completely false.

I would love to have a alternate-history/what if? debate, however in this context we are using cold hard facts and avoiding speculation as much as possible. If this is the discussion you wish to have, send me a mail. I would be more than willing to play along.

You are living in your own little world where every Minmatar is lurking in the shadows, preparing to backstab everyone in the cluster. While it's certainly a chilling and interesting scenario, it's simply not the case in reality. At least, there is nothing to suggest that this is the case. But if one day, my Minmatar colleagues have me locked in a room and are preparing to brutally murder me, I'll be sure to find a way for you to tell me "I told you so" before I'm eviscerated or something.

You speak with great confidence, Ms Dea.

Something to consider. I understand that you like confidence.

It's true! I hope you are victorious.

Now that we've finally cleared some of the misconceptions, I see your point Ms. Dea, though I don't necessarily agree with it.

The primordial and brutal bloodlust of your people may have been necessary to break free from the bondage of slavery, however it's rather obsolete in todays day and age. The Republic seeks to grow as a nation and one day have the power and influence of the other big three. In order to be able to successfully do so, they need to adapt and evolve.The days of rebellion are over for citizens of the Republic, now it's time to settle down and act like a full nation.

In order to do so, the Republic needs to break away from barbarism that you suggest Matari tradition.

Hit and run tactics work in a small scale. They put a lot of attrition on your enemy forces. However, they don't win the war. HIt and run tactics leading up to a climatic uniform battle? Yes. But you can't win a war without actually fighting your enemy. You must also remember that the civilians your enemy is protecting are not your enemy. You NEVER want to make the civillians hate you. You can invade an entire nation and annex it to yours if you can convince the civilian population that you are actually on your side. This isn't a invasion, but a liberation! Treat civilians properly and they will be the most valuable asset you have in countering the insurgency that will rise during occupation. This is what the Amarr failed to do when they launched the Reclaiming, and this is what the Elder fleet failed to do.

Anyway, getting back on track. What worked in the past doesn't always work in the future. Fighting the Amarrians like you are revolting slaves when you are really uniformed soldiers is going to end badly. It's simply not going to work. My experience in nullsec has taught me that "quantity is a quality all its own". It doesn't matter if your forces are scattered in small squads raiding the Empire. If the golden armada is razing your capital, your going to go back to the days of slave revolt. While this may seem like an appealing situation to you, it's unfavorable for the future of the Republic.

The end of the Gallente Caldari war was due to the increasingly clear premise of mutually assured destruction. If the Gallente kept fighting, we wouldn't regain the Caldari but only destroy ourselves. If the Caldari kept fighting, they wouldn't obtain their independence but only be annihilated.

This is the situation that you have if the Matari take up the doctrine that you describe. It's simply outdated and won't work well for either faction.

To be fair, the Elder fleet would of made it all the way to the Amarr homeworld if it wasn't for Jamyl's "miracle". Of course whether this is due to your new found proficiency in uniform fighting or the poor organizational skills of the Empire is a matter of debate.

That is a beautiful and elegant expression of Gallente war tact at its finest. Liberation. It's a proud word used within your holoreels and pitches. You think within the realm of saving people. It is noble.

However, we think within another shade of that same realm. Where you want to be the shining example of humanity, we want to be the harsh reminder instead.

Every man, woman, and child fights.


That's our society. That's how we've been raised in this era. This explains why there's always refugees and the lure of life within Amarrian culture is always tempting. As people grow older, I would actually recommend that of them.

Leave the rest of our society to continue its fight.

To suggest we not longer have to live this way is to imply we have no reason to fear anyone and that the Amarrians on our border, or any opposing cultures. You are among the giants on our border and part of that club. You could very easily show up and take what you what, like the Amarrians.

Surely you're not a kind of people who would do that. But you're still this giant. We'd be stupid to not imagine such a possibility especially when your culture half of the time doesn't understand ours.

Anyways. Your Federation's populace hasn't had any reason to live like us. People volunteer but never have had to face the prospect that "everyone fights". Nor have they experienced the nightmare that awaits them if they fail (there are greater things to fear than death itself).

Never has anyone had a reason to fear their own shadow. Not with that kind of war machine able to fight for them.

That is a weakness of your people, quoted from someone who has served from within your society. I just left the Gallente front recently, coming in as another freedom fighter pilot eager to be taught Gallente battle tact and join your forces in fighting the Statesmen. Of course, did I have other agendas? Yes. I wanted to observe life within the Federation, draw an understanding of their immortals and their society.

There are others I wish to visit in time.

Clarifying simply that I can speak a little of Gallente culture and not be talking out of my arse.

You are a noble people, a passionate and wealthy mass of people, backed by a war machine that has no limits.

We are anything but that. Yet we've been fighting an Empire since the earliest days we could take spaceflight again. This war has nearly ruined us but yet the Amarrians (the good ones) have always offered a hand to a better life.

We don't hold many grudges, we're savage, remember? We do dark things all the time. We don't bat an eyelid to them. Hence why the Cartel is so established within our domain.

So why haven't more of us left to join the better Amarrian life? Grudges aside.

And in your hate-induced invasion, wouldn't you be proclaiming the same message? "We're here to liberate you." ...that message has been uttered like an endless record long before you showed up. The society of ours that still exists is a society that has ignored that message. If you invade, perhaps more will consider it. Yet the majority still won't.

Unless Minmatar forgets everything that is Minmatar, they will not want liberation. No, your arrival would be just another giant arriving under false banner and agenda, after all there is hate that needs to be sated at this point in such a war.

You won't liberate nearly as many as you think.


Now. In regards to war:

There is prospect that every commander wonders and you highlighted it here. You control the populace, you win with war.

What every commander fails to remember and to you, the Federation, is almost alien to you (judging especially by your reactions to this topic), is that this includes your own populace.

How we could very possibly (keeping an open mind) win over your people without liberating them:

- We give them passionate hate, or fear. Enough to inspire a chase to which is more an unwinnable trap than any real trail.
- We make sure women and children are on the menu, not just in choice of targets but who it is you're fighting. If the cruisers you chase down are commanded by teenagers, do you feel justice?
- We support our populace in revealing the darker human side to yours. Which is a no brainer for our race. You're already a lot more alike to the Amarrians than you think in our eyes.
- Victory comes when your population turns against you. While the war certainly profits uncontested, your people don't consider it worth it anymore and consider they've lost a lot more than they've gained. Worse, if the image is pushed, that you're just as savage as we are, much of your people's admiration of its military will tank. Peace rallies form to end the war, riots begin to occur all over the place.

In time, you end the war and pull out.

This entire formula does not work traditionally. But circumstances have lined up between our two societies that present a very interesting opportunity. Will it be easy? No. A number of stars will have continue staying aligned or will need to still align (such as other Minmatar minorities rallying to the cause) for this to be possible.

Notice the resource demands of such an agenda. They're very minimal. They're also very much already in place and would remain in place during such a war.

I honestly agree with the majority of what you said in the first half or so of your post. Nobody knows the concept of "Freedom isn't free" better than your people. In a way, I admire that. Many Gallenteans think that we can sit in our lovely Federation and damn the rest of the world without worrying. In a sense they are correct, but It shouldn't be that way. The fact that politicians can rally for war without ever seeing the horrifying effects of their legislation is something that I despise.



If we ever had to invade and occupy the Republic, we would make damn well sure to avoid repeating the mistakes of the Amarr. Our goal would not be to conquer you. The maps will still show the Republic as separate space from the Federation if you will. If an invasion was necessary, we would most likely put a Federation friendly government in place and leave. In order to have a Federation friendly government, we'd need a Federation friendly civilian populace, other wise the new regime would be lynched the moment we went back home.

To do this we help out the civilians. Finish that tower that the old regime said would be complete a decade ago, rid the space lanes of pirates and even privateers hired by the old regime to get a little more tax money, have our soldiers deliver their spare food and water to the impoverished. If insurgency rises up then who will the civilians support? Their country men that only want to put the previous government in power, the one that screwed them over so many times? Or the foreigners who have done more for them then their own government ever has.

Several civillizations were adopted into the Federation this way. The Intaki is a great example of this. We didn't necessarily invade them, but their biggest request when joining the Federation was for a large military presence to enter their space. That's right, they wanted us to "invade".



The problem is, how do you exactly go about filling our people's minds and hearts with fear and hatred of their own government? It's not like you would be able to control the media. Even still, Federal citizens will always be loyal to the Federation. They might be against the war the Federation is fighting or the people in the government, but they will never outright go against their own country.

Citizens may be against the war, it's happened quite often before. However they will never revolt against their own government unless they really had to. And if they really had to, I would support the revolt.

This Section proves the similarities between the Federation and the Amarr. You would replace the government with a Federation friendly government, not because it benefits the us, but because it benefits the Federation. What about replacing the government with one that has the best interest of the Minmatar, regardless of how friendly they would be to you? That would show your genuine concern for our well being, and be more effective in swaying the opinions of the population then buying them off.

I have stated in several topics that what must be done is to improve the structure of the Republic; economically, socially, culturally, and militarily so that we may be able to stand with out heads held high and not depend on others for aide. This is something that only we as a people can accomplish for ourselves. It cannot be given to us. We must earn it through the hard work and struggles of our people to achieve it. With the Tribal Council now leading us, the Tribes can now begin to work towards this goal.

I still hold to the old ways, in the hope that they may bring peace and respite to our people, who after so much strife deserve it.

Though I do not deny what she says, for there is a measure of truth to it, I believe we are still above being controlled by such base emotions, only that we have been taught how to access them more readily.

You may think of Isis Dea's and her ideology as the sword, while mine as the shield.

You do realize that it's possible to be friendly to another nation and still support your own people right?

If we wanted a government that would be 100% loyal and devoted to us, we would just annex you or turn you into a puppet state. However as I told Ms. Dea earlier, that is something we would never be interested in. Not only would the Federation have to deal with your plethora of problems, but the Matari would be an oddity, the first culture to be forced into the Federation. That just sets the stage for civil war.