Intergalactic Summit

I've made my views known before, but for the benefit of those not following everything I say religiously, to me the late Admiral Noir is a very tragic character, to put it short.

Whether he was somehow framed or whether he somehow suffered a bout utter insanity, both are tragic ends for a man who devoted a large part of their life to try and uphold peace, after having seen what war was first hand.

I don't think I've ever claimed that I found Alexander Noir's final actions redeemable, and I don't understand why you act like I did. Yes he might be your hero, but heroes are also human. My most basic gripe is this - you absolutely refuse to believe and/or admit that your hero might have also been a war criminal, even if what else he did might have ultimately lead to something better. Because objectively viewed, his actions were also a crime, regardless of what it lead to. Each time we've discussed this you have refused to admit that crimes committed during wartime are still crimes. You are literally doing what you are preaching against - letting a criminal off the hook for a crime he according to many most certainly did, because he is someone you deeply respect.

It pisses me off, because I can't understand why. And It hurts me because in the past I looked up to you and respected you, for lack of a better term, for being a "logical rock". I know you probably don't care about any of that but maybe it helps you understand why I am acting like I do.



Back to the topic, the case is anything but clear cut. Alexander Noir was known as an advocate for peace, so much so that he won the Aidonis the previous year, an award that is given in recognition of individuals who have significantly advanced the cause of peace and stability throughout New Eden. He was widely respected, even by his counterparts in the Caldari Navy, and for these merits he was chosen to deliver the Federation delegation to the peace meeting.
Then he suddenly goes mad, rams a station that has its shields mysteriously malfunctioning at the same time, killing hundreds of thousands of people while apparently yelling dialogue that would make even a b-class holovid writer blush in embarrassment.
Yes, there is clearly nothing suspicious about any of this, no reason for conspiracy theories at all, and anyone who thinks otherwise is clearly just trying excuse a mass-murder.

More than 100 years of dedicated public service in the interests of promoting peace, there's your trick. Not 100 years of PR fluff, 100 years of actual accomplishments.

Have you ever dedicated 100 years towards a singular pursuit?

Have you even dedicated one year towards a singular pursuit?

How likely is it that a man spends his ENTIRE LIFE dedicated towards a cause, and it turns out, he doesn't actually give a damn about it, and you can't judge anything about them by it. He was just doing the same thing uninterrupted for 100 years with no noticeable hiccups because, screw it, why not?

Does anyone here claim to know what the guy's favorite flavor of ice cream is (Grath pls) or if he ever cheated on his wife? No. So we don't know the guy's personal life, don't claim to, and we don't really need to. But when the guy so obviously centered his life around that single cause of peace, I think it's pretty damn obvious that he's not the type to ram a ******* supercarrier into a station in order to start a war. You don't find that inconsistency a little strange?

Am I out of left field here? Someone help me out, I'm confused as to how anyone who followed his life's accomplishments would think you couldn't read him, that he was some sort of enigma. The guy was a ******* teddy bear until he apparently randomly decided to murder 600,000 fellow peace advocates.

I've never seen a public figure so singularly dedicated to a cause before. 100 years and he happens to have a total change of heart the moment a station's shields inexplicably go offline and he's piloting a super near it? I have a hard time truly believing that. Not because of emotion or excuses, but because it insults my intelligence and the degree to which I was paying attention.

You know, in all this time I never once seriously considered clonejacking as anything but a ridiculous conspiracy theory to explain what happened that day.

...but considering that a senior SoCT official was clonejacked at the Kyonoke Inquest just a month ago, maybe it's not so crazy an idea after all.

What separates a crime from mental sickness is intent. I've already agreed with you (actually I may have been the first to point it out!) that Tovil-Toba never intended to hit a city with the debris of his ship - he had a crippled ship and no way of telling how it would break up. Noir, on the other hand, quite eloquently documented HIS intent.

You cannot argue, however, that the effect of what Tovil-Toba did was to bring down the U-Nat government and create enough chaos to buy sufficient time for a large enough population of Caldari to make it off the planet that the future of the State was viable. We don't honour the devastation of Heuromont, we honour his sacrifice and the sacrifices of lhis crew..

Was Noir the sole actor? Obviously not. I've never suggested that he sabotaged the station's shields, have I? Was he clonejacked? As Xadiran said, I've never even considered it possible until very recently - and whilst I'll stipulate that the procedure has now been proven possible, nothing has made it probable, let alone likely. Please bring me evidence that isn't based on the kind of hero worship all you Federal apologists are accusing ME of - let you be the one to 'full ass' it, as you say.

What evidence? That it wasn't in character? I have acknowledged that anomaly - but people act out of character frequently. It's almost the first quote you'll get after a murder conviction if you poll people who knew the criminal "I never knew he had it in him. There were no signs. It's always the quiet, polite, ones." I mean, pardon me for pulling the jaded cop act, but this isn't just a sterotype it is routine.

That said, I'm willing to be proved wrong on the matter of Noir's criminal culpability. There are certainly enough anomalies that it warrants an investigation - an investigation that the Federation has had many years to carry out. Here's a point in support of Priano-haani's comment though - Noir did not reclone after getting onboard the Wandering Saint. The infomorph piloting the Saint when it crashed is the same infomorph who passed all the Navy security checks and the scrutiny of his peers. If someone was passing as Noir he had the collusion of more than the people who shut down the station shields - and most of them were Federal Navy.

I'm going to accept your correction regarding the nature of the conference - provided you stipulate that correcting the relations slide between the Federation and the State was a major motivation of the conference, despite it's economic nature. Wasn't the economic investment supposed to help the State out of it's economic woes and provide it with an image of the Federation as a saviour and friend?

Speaking as not a federal apologist, the shield sabotage remains for me the most damning evidence. It points to a degree of committed planning that precludes sudden psychosis or a wild and entirely out-of-character swing in Noir's attitude.

You just don't sabotage a station's shields easily or on a whim, let alone when that station is in a state of heightened security as it prepares to receive a foreign VIP on a highly visible international visit. In fact, I'd suggest you don't do it at all without considerable and high-quality resources.

And you certainly don't do it from inside a Nyx.



Hmm. If you think about it that might have been even more damaging to the State's existence in the long run than any mere terrorist attack. To be dragged out of an economic downturn by the charity of our oldest enemy...quite aside from the shame a lot of Caldari would have felt, it would also have undermined faith in our social and economic model, without which... I mean, what is the State but its social and economic model?

A sensible long-term strategic analysis would recognize this.

I don't think it was me accusing you of hero worship. I don't deny the intentional and unintentional effects of Tovil-Toba's actions. But if one of the effects of Noir's actions was the start of the war, then the first attack of that war was also an effect of Noir's actions. So let's try to keep unforeseen effects out of how we judge someone's heroism, shall we?

I'm glad to see you find the possibility of a conspiracy more likely than I thought. Up until now, I did not notice you (or most other Caldari in this thread) addressing the shield's failing. which is part of the stronger evidence I was referring to.
I think, judging from your comments, that you may be unaware of how widespread clonejacking is, at least currently. I suggest you to keep an eye out for illegal deadspace cloning facilities. Those sites have grown in number quite a bit in the period preceding the Kyonoke Inquest.
Also, like Verin, I'm not a Federal apologist. There are reasons I left the Federation. I don't like how it has changed since YC110. Twice I've mentioned that, in the case of a conspiracy, the FIO is one of my top suspects, but that's obviously a little biased, as it is no secret that I'm not a fan of Blaque. I guess I could more easily understand you calling me a Noir apologist, but I still would not agree that I am.

Yes, when someone discovers he was living next to a murderer, rarely do they say something like "I was wondering why he was dragging all those decapitated corpses around..." Yes, criminals rarely drop hints to those not in the know. They usually also prefer to stay out of the lime light, stay quiet. I don't think you can equate the ignorance of neighbors who likely only say "Good day." to the criminal in their midst with someone living a public life like Noir's. And I wouldn't call Noir quiet. But yes, Foiritan himself did say "no one suspected that he was capable of such a monstrous act." I can't deny that, but I don't consider an absence of hints that he could be capable of monstrous acts as evidence that he was capable of such things, even more so because "no one" were not his distant neighbors, but people he worked with him closely, and..his wife.

I am glad you agree that there should be an investigation. If I'm not mistaken, that means that in a way, you actually agree with me that some of the scenarios in the OP should be investigated more thoroughly (or publicly) than has been done. However, it would also be good for the State to investigate this, no? It was affected as about as much as the Federation.

As I wrote in my last post, the summit was not officially a peace conference. And I pointed to there being a reason for the conference, I even mentioned it. I guess I could have worded myself more clearly. So let me stipulate: correcting the relations slide between the Federation and the State was a major motivation of the conference, despite it's economic nature.I can agree with some of this, mostly the last paragraph.

Yes, there was an investigation, and it was mentioned in the news. Foiritan named it an "exhaustive and ongoing investigation". However, not even 4 days after the attack, before the investigation was finished, and a few weeks before the Tripwire fiasco, they reached this conclusion "all loss of life in Malkalen that tragic day can be attributed directly to the actions of Noir alone,", and we never heard more on the subject. So I have some doubts about the quality, objectivity and thoroughness of the investigation.

So, Couple of questions here.

First off, how could he have some random psychotic break yet someone else had to go in and drop the shields? Sounds way more premeditated than someone who was going through a psychotic episode.

Second, Wouldnt such an infiltration require a long period of time to initiate in order to get the shields down? I imagine state security isn't exactly school boys in uniforms and they know what they are doing.

Lastly, if a group sophisticated enough to take out the station's security with such an insanely high profile event, would it not call to reason these same actors might have enough ability to clone jack a ranking official with in the gallente navy?