Intergalactic Summit

That's an interesting point, but I think you have to take the old Caldari saying to heart:

"My kirjuun and I against my suuolo. My suuolo and I against the Citizen. The Citizen and I against the Jaijii."

Nationalism can very easily become complacency and entropy. The lack of a strong central government allows the Caldari to ensure that we don't get whipped up by a single charismatic leader and driven onto the rocks of hero worship. Look what happened when we briefly entertained the idea that one man was bigger than the eight!

If an idea has merit, it will win out in the marketplace of ideas. If it is without merit it will be brutally suppressed. This is the Way.

Welcome to joining the discussion late and misunderstanding what is being said too.

Makoto-haan;

If I may, I feel that no further service may come from this conversation. PYRE is independent-minded and perhaps somewhat Practical-minded by nature, and have an eye more for efficiency than orders. The debate isn't necessarily, then, about heiian so much as it is the best way to follow heiian. Is it nobler to follow orders and give due deference to the State even when the Winds cut with bitterest, deadly cold, or is it nobler to husband one's strength so that it may be put to use where it is more than a gesture, when it will indeed achieve an end for the State?

PYRE takes the latter view, an understandable one when one's war is the slow, steady simmer of Black Rise.

We may differ from them in our views, but castigating those who disagree more on methods than ideals does no one service.

I have a responsibility to my kirjuun and to my Corporation. I don't know who you are.

Getting back to our conversation after that previous interlude....

Factionalism exists everywhere to some degree, even in our somewhat more unified Amarrian government (the stories we could all tell....). I'm simply not sure it's something that should be necessarily encouraged at all levels. If unity can sometimes, at their extremes, lead to complacency and entropy, then factionalism can lead to dissonance and strife. However, whereas unity is always held in tension with the natural ability of people to form differing opinions, there really isn't much to stop people's disagreements from turning confrontational.

I think the most important problem with that latter problem is that ideas aren't necessarily adopted because they're good ideas, but because their proponents may have more influence or, in most cases, more guns. If there is one thing we as Amarrians have learned, it is that the worst stagnation occurs not because of a centralized culture, but because people decide they don't need to listen anymore.

Essentially, that lies at the heart of the factionalist approach. One group holds one view, one group holds another, and the victor isn't always determined by who is actually right.

Please don't get into an argument with me :)

That's an interesting concept, Father. I look forward to seeing how it weathers the marketplace of ideas...

Honestly, my opinion of the matter is that neither those who went nor those who stayed are faulted. It was a pure difference between people who went on principle and those who stayed for pragmatism. I don't think anyone should be blamed for staying. It was very obviously dangerous and had a slim chance of success, especially with CONCORD's track record for leadership.

On the other hand, I think most people who went knew the risks. There is a principle at stake here for them. From outside our safer havens, less scrupulous forces swoop in to take from our people. At best, there are people attacking good citizens for cargo and ransom. At worst, they're farming them as food. However slight, I don't think one could be blamed for wanting to make the attempt at improving the lives of those who live, sometimes forgotten, on the fringes of our empires. As much as I fault CONCORD for their logistics, I don't fault them for their reasoning. They did at least try to hold those factions to account.

It's difficult to say whether anyone could be blamed for going or not going at that point. Are fights doomed to failure still worth fighting, or should we only ever take up arms when we know we can win? I think both views are needed. When CONCORD announced this venture, it was those zealot's job to make sure that their voice was heard and that we forgot our petty grievances to focus on our growing, universal threats. It was the pragmatist's job to say that either this was not the time, this was not a fight worth fighting, or to take charge and organize the fleets into something more coherent.

I think the biggest problem was in communication, when those who went turned their noses up at their fellows' cowardice, and their fellows in turn shrugged and returned to what they were doing. Surely, to perform such an operation requires the coordinated action of all our peoples and all their skills. It is the one advantage we have over most groups operating in nullsec space. We are not united by force or by profit, but by a common belief in civilization.

Last I checked I received no direct deployment orders from CalNav or any representative of the CEP; I'm certainly not one to go on a fool's errand without a briefing, or prior intelligence. Anyone with any degree of foresight could have easily predicted what would happen when a disorganized rabble without clear lines of communication, mission orders, fleet experience, or discipline conduct an operation: a complete clusterfuck.

If partaking in clusterfucking is now the standards of honour held by some of those in this communique then that says more about them than it does about me. Because I've got better things to do than waste my time than being berated by those who make the tea of sorrow with the bitter tears of their own regrets. There were no orders here, no obligations, no legal mandate - there was only a request made by CONCORD endorsed tangentially by the CEP as a signatory. If one volunteers for such an operation that took place then I would say they were either ignorant or negligent, and no amount of spouting in public about shame and dishonour will change my position that it was both foolish and unwise to choose to volunteer ones lives and assets one is responsible for in such an operation.

Sweet Maker's mercy who knew that pragmatism is to be so abhorred these days by those who call themselves Caldari. Or that the concepts of mission-order specific doctrines and independent operations have been so forgotten that it is actually believed the romanticism of honour and elan alone will carry one to victory. That the idea of fighting smart and engaging with maximum advantage is to be disparaged in favour of simply jumping off a cliff.

I'm certainly not going to accept being lectured on orders or honour by those who are sitting pretty on the sidelines while I'm busy fighting against a dark beast of a Federation under Roden and Blaque for in the end my orders are to send as many Federalist sons and daughters back to their families in body bags and my honour is written in the blood of the enemies of Kaalakiota.

Apologies; I didn't spot you in the milieu. Given the conditions I'm unsurprised, I suppose. I hope that the flight went well for you, all things considered.