Intergalactic Summit

Citizens of the State!

Six years ago our State has finally risen from the knees, making all us proud to be Caldari. Former State, barely managing to hold its sovereignty against treacherous Federation, has grown up and evolved. Not only we gained real meritocracy, but we have managed to return our ancestral homeworld from gallentean occupation, and we were even able to dictate our will to crumbling Federation.

Six years ago the whole State was united with a single goal. This day there weren't patriots, practicals and liberals. There were Caldari, who all were fighting together as a single nation, to return our home back. All this was made possible by cunning and daring planning of a single man, after whom all the Caldari have followed willingly, like in the time of the old Raata Empire.

And with blood and sweat, the Caldari Prime was ours once again. Many peoples have payed their lives for this, but it wasn't in vain. The goal was achieved and their heroism will be remembered in thousands of years! And we, who are living today, here and now, shouldn't forget our heroes. We must not discard this advance they made, paying their lives, not for their corporations, not for their political block, but for whole State and whole Caldari nation.

It is a treason not only to the State, but to our ancestors, our heroes, our history and our spirit, to allow Gallenteans to occupy our world once again, even smallest part of it. Thus the treaties that Reppola signs with Federation, are anti-Caldari, since they are targeted to prevent us from taking what is ours.

But gallenteans have shown us their face already: it was the face of Admiral Noir, who rammed Malkalen station, it was face of gallentean gangsters on Caldari Prime, who were writing "Exterminate all Caldari", and it is a face of President Foiritan, who was smiling like nothing were happening. Those of us, who can think, will see the real actions behind sweet lying gallentean words.

And it is our duty, citizens, to clean our homeworld from gallentean oppression, occupation and infestation. Now, while the CEP is reluctant to give Federation proper answer for attacking our homeworld once again, our hands are bound, but our minds and hearts are not!

Let us today remember all fallen heroes, including our former executor Tibus Heth (who died recently to a Sansha incursion, but without whom our homeworld would be still occupied by gallentean oppressors) and give them thanks for restoring the State, returning us our stolen homeworld and giving all us hope for brighter future.

Glory to the State!

Just this morning in fact, I was musing on the notion that if Heth had founded the New Meritocracy, retaken the Homeworld and then promptly disbanded the CPD and retired, he'd have gone down in history as one of the greatest Caldari to ever live.

Funny how overreaching ambition can change things, ain't it?

Indeed. I have to take a step back from myself lately and rethink Heth. I've thought he was scum since he co-opted news of Otro Gariushi's death to burn down the warpath, and his actions around the time of the battle for the Shiigeru left a bad taste in my mouth, but I have to accept that his actions between those events were much better. While I wish things hadn't turned out quite like they have, I am not sure we'd have a single sliver of home without Heth leading troops there, and the Caldari leadership needed a good shakeup.

Kraid, Heth was never a hero, and few of the things he did were laudable. At best he was a man with unswerving dedication to imposing his vision of reality on the world - a trait that can be grudgingly admired, perhaps, but not celebrated. If you look a little further into the CPD and the cult of personality built around him, you discover that a vast number of the positive changes in the early days of the New Meritocracy were the work of Janus Bravor, his ill-fated adjutant and aide, who took a leave of medical absence under mysterious circumstances and never resurfaced.

If we are to consider Heth's actions between his vulture-like glee for Ishukone's misfortune and his eventual well-deserved condemnation by the State at large, we must consider that during this time he was constantly working against the greater interests of the State. He was embezzling from Kaalakiota, a corporation that trusted him with leadership, to support the CPD, a piece of politlcal machinery primarily geared towards ensuring he maintained power. He spearheaded the victimization of Ishukone by the rest of the State while using the tragedy of Malkalen as a rallying cry for war. On that note, he started and continued a war that has quite demonstrably not benefited the State in any tangible way. He enriched himself off selling "development rights" on captured systems that don't and will never actually belong to the State to its constituent megacorporations - and then withdrew them when it pleased him. Many of his actions were instrumental in precipitating a financial crisis that has left the State deeply indebted to Amarrian financial interests - a dependency which is anathema to the Caldari ideals of autarky and self-reliance.

His administration perhaps, with some justice, made life better for the average Caldari citizen, but you have to remember that during all the time he did this he was embezzling, associating with and funding terrorist groups such as the Templis Dragonaurs and leeching off the newfound vitality of the State to fuel his own personal vendettas. We in the Federation don't celebrate Luc Duvailer just because he spearheaded legislation to cut waiting times at hospitals.

The question is, do we weigh Home and Meritocracy as being worth more than the rest of that litany of sin?

Oh don't get me wrong, I still think Heth is scum.
I am merely pointing out that there were some positive aspects. The stuff like embezzlement didn't happen overnight, and like Hakatain pointed, out, we would have been much better off if setting things in motion was as far as Heth had been allowed to take things, but he nevertheless did put some positive things into motion wh

Fire renews the forest, just as it can spiral out of control and destroy it as well, and it is a tough philosophical debate on whether good and evil are more based on actions or intent.


I'm not sure anymore.
I'm not even sure if saying yes overvalues Home. It's very important, but so is not having a leader racking up a rap sheet.

Let me put it this way. It may sound brutal, it may sound unkind, perhaps even callous, but this is the way it is.

Heth did not give you Caldari Prime. He stole Caldari Prime.

Now, before you say anything: yes, perhaps In theory, he stole Caldari Prime in the name of the people it actually belongs to. Perhaps he stole it from thieves. The issue, as with almost everything that Heth touched, is that the situation wasn't as simple as he made it out to be. Heth launched an unprovoked invasion of Federal territory to seize the one, sole part of it that the people of the Federation don't have a stronger claim to than the State. His attack killed hundreds of thousands of Federal crewmen and civilians, and the "peace" he demanded was forced upon the Federation at the barrel of a world-ending gun. Then, far worse, he broke this promise of peace and declared war again, this time trying to seize worlds and star systems upon which the State had never and will never have any claim.

Not even Heth was stupid enough to believe the Federation would simply sit and do nothing. To do so would have demonstrated a weakness that we would not and could not show, for our safety as much as our pride - if one enemy could do this to us, others might believe they could do the same, as Uriam Kador's ill-fated excursion into Solitude aptly demonstrated. A response had to be formulated. A retort had to be issued.

Heth never delivered a single inch of Caldari Prime to the people of the State that existed without threat of war or reconquest. As long as there was war, as long as the State considered us targets, the Federation couldn't back down. We didn't want war, but peace on Heth's terms was the worse option. And so it went, and billions more lives had to be lost before finally, Heth's grip on the reins of power slipped and Ishukone was able to offer us a way of backing out of this war that didn't look like a retreat or a surrender.

Heth never gave you Caldari Prime. Ishukone is giving you Caldari Prime, inch by inch, and believe you me, I think in the end the Federation will be glad to be rid of it.

What you say is true, Pieter. And in time, despite the countless lives that have been lost, I hope - I dearly hope, more than anything in this world - that it was all worth it. Then maybe, in some distant, convoluted way, Heth will have done something good for both our peoples.

Official relations were still far too frosty for an open diplomatic approach, I understand. A lobby group is all very well (and I'm sure that Ishukone had one) but without Senators willing to stand up and argue the point in the Senate, it would get nowhere.

Championing handing back Caldari Prime was political suicide until events changed that - especially given the State's hardline position on sharing sovereignty and the rights / privileges of the Federation settlers, who we viewed as a cross between thieves and rapists.

In fact, it was that issue that I think was starting to be opened up for debate when Noir set relations back a century by stuffing a capital ship into the Malkalen station and reopening hostilities.

"Hey, guys! Hold my cheese and watch this!"

I clearly need more sleep. I've gotten to the point of reading Kim threads.