Bit of Analysis: Honor Harrington III

[Ahriman238]

The main thing we need right now (and I apologize to Weber if this in Distant Thunder or Shadow of Freedom) is an infodump on Beowulf, Mesa, their mutual history and their goals. These things have been hinted at, and Weber's made it clear that he intends to expand upon these things, to show that some Beowulfians are assholes and some Mesans are good people working from the best of intentions, but he needs to get on that. As early as the second book we had sympathetic Haven characters to bond with, there's no equivalent of this in the Mesan Alignment, and despite Anton and Victor living on Mesa for a while, we understand so little of the average Mesans' lives.

It'd also be nice to hear more about the Beowulf Code Mesa is so hateful towards. We know that it's the standard version of medical ethics basically everywhere, that it treats doctor/patient confidentiality as sacrosanct outside a few carefully delineated exceptions, and shuns genetic tweaking except to correct specific defects and genetic disorders. That's it. Obviously the last part is Mesa's main problem but some more detail would sure be nice.

[Simon_Jester]

The main thing we need right now (and I apologize to Weber if this in Distant Thunder or Shadow of Freedom) is an infodump on Beowulf, Mesa, their mutual history and their goals. These things have been hinted at, and Weber's made it clear that he intends to expand upon these things, to show that some Beowulfians are assholes and some Mesans are good people working from the best of intentions, but he needs to get on that. As early as the second book we had sympathetic Haven characters to bond with, there's no equivalent of this in the Mesan Alignment, and despite Anton and Victor living on Mesa for a while, we understand so little of the average Mesans' lives.

He is working on it a bit. There are about two sympathetic Alignment characters in Cauldron of Ghosts, Jack McBryde's brother and... Irvine? The informant guy, who's sympathetic if nothing else because of his thankless job and chronic bad luck.

The backstory overall of Beowulf and Mesa... hm. Honestly I need to reread those novels to be sure what they do and do not contain on the subject.

It'd also be nice to hear more about the Beowulf Code Mesa is so hateful towards. We know that it's the standard version of medical ethics basically everywhere, that it treats doctor/patient confidentiality as sacrosanct outside a few carefully delineated exceptions, and shuns genetic tweaking except to correct specific defects and genetic disorders. That's it. Obviously the last part is Mesa's main problem but some more detail would sure be nice.

Yeah.

[Ahriman238]

Time for negotiations to get started, beginning with most of a chapter introducing Haven's delegates and the meeting site. We also get probably our first glimpse into the politics of the reborn Republic of Haven outside of Prichart's Cabinet meetings. There appear to be at least four main Haven political parties; New Democrat, New Conservative, Corporate Conservative, and Constitutional Progressive. Little is discussed of their individual platforms and policies. The New Conservatives begin from a position of distrust as both the party of Arnold Giancola and the "natural home of firebrands who have an axe to grind with Manticore." While the Constitutional Progressives seem like the old ex-Aprilists' home, including one Eloise Prichart.

Honor Alexander-Harrington hoped she looked less nervous than she felt as she and the rest of the Manticoran delegation followed Alicia Hampton, Secretary of State Montreau's personal aide, down the short hallway on the two hundredth floor of the Nouveau Paris Plaza Falls Hotel.

The Plaza Falls had been the showplace hotel of the Republic of Haven's capital city for almost two T-centuries, and the Legislaturalists had been careful to preserve it intact when they created the People's Republic of Haven. It had served to house important visitors—Solarian diplomats (and, of course, newsies being presented with the Office of Public Information's view of the galaxy), businessmen being wooed as potential investors, off-world black marketeers supplying the needs of those same Legislaturalists, heads of state who were being "invited" to "request Havenite protection" as a cheaper alternative to outright conquest, or various high-priced courtesans being kept in the style to which they had become accustomed.

The Committee of Public Safety, for all its other faults, had been far less inclined towards that particular sort of personal corruption. Rob Pierre, Cordelia Ransom, and their fellows had hardly been immune to their own forms of empire building and hypocrisy, but they'd seen no reason to follow in the Legislaturalists' footsteps where the Plaza Falls was concerned. Indeed, the hotel had been regarded by the Mob as a concrete symbol of the Legislaturalists' regime, which explained why it had been thoroughly vandalized during the early days of Rob Pierre's coup. Nor was that the only indignity it had suffered, since the Committee had actually encouraged its progressive looting, using it as a sort of whipping boy whenever the Mob threatened to become dangerously rowdy. The sheer size of the hotel had meant looting it wasn't a simple afternoon's work, so it had made a useful diversion for quite some time.

Hotel hosting both the Manticoran delegation and the peace talks. Is every single bloody building in the city of Nouveau Paris a sort of microcosm of Havenite history? And how big is the place that it takes "quite some time," with an implied scale of years. to loot?

In the end, even something with two hundred and twenty floors had eventually run out of things to steal, break, or deface, and (fortunately, perhaps) a ceramacrete tower was remarkably nonflammable. Several individual rooms, and one complete floor, had been burned out by particularly persistent arsonists, but by and large, the Plaza Falls had survived . . . more or less. The picked-clean carcass had been allowed to molder away, ignored by any of the Committee's public works projects. It had sat empty and completely ignored, and most people had written it off as something to be eventually demolished and replaced.

But demolishing a tower that size was no trivial task, even for a counter-gravity civilization, and to everyone's considerable surprise, the privatization incentives Tony Nesbit and Rachel Hanriot had put together after Theisman's coup had attracted a pool of investors who were actually interested in salvaging the structure, instead. More than that, they'd honestly believed the Plaza Falls could be restored to its former glory as a piece of living history—and a profit-making enterprise—that underscored the rebirth of the Republic as a whole.

Asked and answered, 220 stories. And of course, like Pericard Tower the place gets renovated and restored to former glory after the rebirth of the Republic.

Despite their enthusiasm, the project had been bound to run into more difficulties than any sane person would have willingly confronted, but they'd been thoroughly committed by the time they figured that out. In fact, failure of the project would have spelled complete and total ruin for most of the backers by that point. And so they'd dug in, tackled each difficulty as it arose, and to everyone's surprise (quite probably their own more than anyone else's), they'd actually succeeded. It hadn't been easy, but the result of their labors really had turned into an emblem of the Republic's economic renaissance, and even though Haven remained a relatively poor star nation (by Manticoran standards, at least), its resurgent entrepreneurial class was robust enough to turn the Plaza Falls into a genuine moneymaker. Not at the levels its renovators had hoped for, perhaps, but with enough cash flow to show a modest—Honor suspected a very modest—profit after covering the various loan payments and operating expenses.

At the rates they're charging, it certainly wouldn't show much of a profit in the Star Empire, she thought, following their guide, but the cost of living's a lot lower here in the Republic, even now. I hate to think what kind of trouble they'd have hiring a staff this devoted back in Landing at the sort of salaries they're paying here! For that matter, these days they couldn't get a staff this qualified back on Grayson this cheaply, either.

Way back in Flag in Exile it was commented that Grayson labor is far cheaper than Manticoran, as is their cost of living. Towards In Enemy Hand/Echoes of Honor/Ashes of Victory, as Manticoran enthusiasm for the war waned with no end in sight and all the extra wartime taxes and duties, they said that Grayson was fine because they're both accustomed to endless war and the only consequence they see outside loss of life is that their standards of living aren't improving as fast as they theoretically might in peacetime. Now we see that Grayson standards of pay and luxuries outstrip Haven, even with the Havenite economy undergoing a second renaissance. Possibly because of Haven's near total war approach to the new war.

She stepped into the combination conference room and suite Pritchart had designated for their "informal talks," and the president rose from her place at one end of the hand polished, genuine wood conference table. The rest of the Havenite delegation followed suit, and Pritchart smiled at Honor.

Like I said, the peace talks will occur in a suite at the Plaza Falls. Later they'll be able to charge premiums for the historic room, I'm sure.

"Please allow me to introduce my colleagues."

"Of course, Madam President."

"Thank you." Pritchart smiled exactly as if someone in that room might actually have no idea who somebody—anybody—else was. In fact, Honor knew, every member of Pritchart's delegation had been as carefully briefed on every member of her delegation as her delegation had been about Pritchart's delegation.

Somehow, I doubt Honor has the patience with this sort of thing to be a brilliant diplomat. Even her social hacks amount to letting her cut through the bullshit, though sometimes that's exactly what you need. Well, on to Haven's VIPs.

"Of course, you've already met Secretary of State Montreau," Pritchart told her. "And you already know Secretary of War Theisman. I don't believe, however, that you've actually been introduced to Mr. Nesbitt, my Secretary of Commerce."

"No, I haven't," Honor acknowledged, reaching out to shake Nesbitt's hand.

She'd been sampling the Havenites' emotions from the moment she stepped through the door, and Nesbitt's were . . . interesting. She'd already concluded that Pritchart was as determined as she was to reach some sort of negotiated settlement. Leslie Montreau's mind glow tasted as determined as Pritchart's, although there was more caution and less optimism to keep that determination company. Thomas Theisman was a solid, unflappable presence, with a granite tenacity and a solid integrity that reminded Honor almost painfully of Alastair McKeon.

We know Nesbitt and Theisman already, but I think this is our first meeting of Giancola's replacement as Secretary of State. You'd think he'd have been sort of crucial to things like their last attempt at a peace conference.

"Leslie and Tony are here not only as representatives of the Cabinet but as representatives of two of our larger political parties," Pritchart explained. "When I organized my Cabinet originally, it seemed pretty clear we were going to need the support of all parties if we were going to make the Constitution work. Because of that, I deliberately chose secretaries from several different parties, and Leslie is a New Democrat, while Tony's a Corporate Conservative." She smiled dryly. "I'm quite certain you've been sufficiently well briefed on our political calculus here Paris to understand just how lively meetings can be when these two sit in on them."

Montreau and Nesbitt both smiled, and Honor smiled back, although she suspected Pritchart was actually understating things.

Interesting that Nesbitt, who was close politically to Giancola is a Corporate, not a New, Conservative. Implying the parties at least were close while Giancola ran the show. And Giancola's replacement is from the other side of the political spectrum.

"Allow me to introduce Senator Samson McGwire," Pritchart said, indicating the man next to Nesbitt.

McGwire was a smallish, wiry man, a good twenty centimeters shorter than Honor. In fact, he was shorter than Pritchart or Leslie Montreau, for that matter. He also had gunmetal-gray hair, a great beak of a nose, blue eyes, bushy eyebrows, and a powerful chin. They were sharp, those eyes, and they glittered with a sort of perpetual challenge. From the way they narrowed as he shook her hand, she wasn't able to decide whether in her case the challenge was because she was a Manticoran, and therefore the enemy, or simply because she was so much taller than he was. For that matter, it could have been both. According to the best briefing Sir Anthony Langtry's staff in the Foreign Office had been able to provide, McGwire was not one of the Star Empire's greater admirers. For that matter, his New Conservative Party was widely regarded as one of the natural homes for Havenite firebrands with personal axes to grind with the Star Empire.

-snip-

"Senator McGwire's the chairman of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee," Pritchart continued. She tilted her head to one side, watching Honor's expression closely, as if trying to determine how much Honor already knew about the senator. "He's here in his capacity as chairman, but also as a representative of the New Conservative Party."

Senator Samson McGwire isn't in the Cabinet, but chairs the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee. If I haven't mentioned it before, under the old Constitution Haven's system of government is essentially identical to contemporary America's. McGwire is no fan of Manticore's, but recognizes that military victory isn't going to happen and they have to come up with the best deal they can. Must be hard as the representative of the extreme anti-Manticore faction.

"And this," Prichart said, turning to a dark-haired, green-eyed woman about thirty T-years younger than Honor, "is Senator Ninon Bourchier. She's the senior ranking Constitutional Progressive member of Senator McGwire's committee."

"Senator Bourchier," Honor acknowledged, and tried not to smile. Bourchier was quite attractive, although nowhere near as striking as Pritchart herself, and she had a bright, almost girlish smile. A smile, in fact, which went rather poorly with the coolly watchful brain behind those guileless jade eyes. There was more than a touch of the predator to Bourchier, although it wasn't in any sense as if she had an active taste for cruelty or violence. No. This was simply someone who was perpetually poised to note and respond to any threat—or opportunity—with instant, decisive action. And of someone who thought very directly in terms of clearly recognized priorities and responsibilities. As a matter of fact, her mind glow tasted a lot like that of a treecat, Honor decided, which wasn't especially surprising, since like Pritchart, Bourchier had been a dedicated member of the Aprilist movement. In fact, ONI had confirmed that she'd been personally responsible for at least seven assassinations, and she'd also been one of the civilian cell leaders who'd not only somehow survived Oscar Saint-Just's best efforts to root out dissidents but also rallied in support of Theisman's coup in the critical hours immediately after the SS commander's date with mortality. And these days she was an influential member of Pritchart's own Constitutional Progressive Party, as well.

Senator Ninon Bourchier, firmly in Prichart's corner and party.

Pritchart cut in smoothly, and gestured to a moderately tall—he was only five or six centimeters shorter than Honor—fair-haired, brown-eyed man who was clearly the youngest person present. He was also the most elegantly tailored, and she felt Nimitz resisting the urge to sneeze as he smelled the fair-haired man's expensive cologne.

"The Honorable Gerald Younger, Admiral Alexander-Harrington," Pritchart said, and Honor nodded to him. "Mr. Younger is a member of our House of Representatives," Pritchart continued. "Like Senator McGwire, he's also a New Conservative, and while he's not its chariman, he sits on the House Foreign Affairs Committee."

"Admiral Alexander-Harrington," Younger said with a white-toothed smile.

"Representative Younger," she replied, and carefully did not wipe the palm of her hand on her trousers when Younger released it. Despite his sleek grooming, he radiated a sort of arrogant ambition and predatory narcissism that made even McGwire seem positively philanthropic.

Gerald Younger, Congressional Representative and member of the long-lost Havenite branch of the Young family. Not really, but he may as well be.

"And this, Admiral Alexander-Harrington," Pritchart said, turning to the final Havenite representative present, "is Chief Justice Jeffrey Tullingham. He's here more in an advisory role than anything else, but I felt it would probably be a good idea to have him available if any legal issues or precedents should happen to raise their heads during our talks."

"That strikes me as an excellent idea, Madam President," Honor said, at least partly truthfully, extending her hand to Tullingham. "It's an honor to meet you, Chief Justice."

"Thank you, Admiral."

He smiled at her, and she smiled back, fully aware—though it was possible he wasn't—that both those smiles were equally false. He wasn't at all pleased to see her here. Which was fair enough, perhaps, or at least reciprocal, since even though Honor agreed with Pritchart that having a legal expert's perspective on the talks was probably a good idea, she wished this particular "legal expert" were far, far away from them. Technically, as the senior member of the Havenite Supreme Court, Tullingham was supposed to be above partisan issues. In fact, although Manticoran intelligence still knew little about his history prior to his appointment to the Court, his mind glow strongly suggested that he was even more closely aligned with McGwire's and Younger's New Conservatives than the analysts had suspected. And despite a carefully cultivated air of nonpartisan detachment, the taste of his personal ambition—and basic untrustworthiness—came through her empathic sensitivity even more clearly than Younger's had.

And finally Jeff Tullingham, Chief Justice of the Haven Supreme Court, diehard conservative and confirmed weasel. He along with Younger will be the stupid, obstructionist members of the talks.

"As you can see, Madam President, Foreign Secretary Langtry decided it would be a good idea to send along at least a few professionals to keep me out of trouble, as well. Allow me to introduce Permanent Undersecretary Sir Barnabas Kew; Special Envoy Carissa Mulcahey, Baroness Selleck; and Assistant Undersecretary the Honorable Voitto Tuominen. And this is my personal aide, Lieutenant Waldemar Tümmel."

Polite murmurs of recognition came back from the Havenite side of the table, although Honor sensed a few spikes of irritation when she used Mulcahy's title. Well, that was too bad. She didn't intend to rub anyone's nose in the fact that Manticore had an hereditary aristocracy and rewarded merit with admission into it, but she wasn't going to spend all of her time here pussyfooting around tender Havenite sensibilities, either.

Making the final count 4 Manticoran and 8 Havenite delegates, even if one of the Havenites is technically an adviser and not a participant. Prichart wasn't kidding that they don't like titles in Haven still, even if they're less... forcefully egalitarian than during the Committee for Public Safety's day.

Kew was the oldest of the trio—with silver hair, sharp brown eyes, a ruddy complexion, and a nose almost as powerful as McGwire's. Tuominen was shortish, but very broad shouldered. He'd always been known as something of a maverick within the ranks of the Foreign Office, and he was as aggressively "commoner" as Klaus Hauptman. Actually, despite the fact that he'd been born on Sphinx, not Gryphon, his personality reminded her strongly of Anton Zilwicki's in many ways, although he was a considerably more driven sort, without Zilwicki's granite, methodical patience. Countess Selleck was the youngest of the three. Blonde-haired, blue-eyed, and attractive in an understated sort of way, she was the intelligence specialist of the Manticoran delegation. She reminded Honor rather strongly of Alice Truman, and not just in a physical sense.

Lieutenant Tümmel was actually the one she'd found most difficult to fit smoothly into place, although that wasn't even remotely his fault. The brown-haired, brown-eyed lieutenant was an extraordinarily competent young man, with enormous potential, yet she felt a lingering guilt at having accepted him as Timothy Mears' replacement. Even now, she knew, she continued to hold him more or less at arms length, as if really accepting him would somehow be a betrayal of Mears' memory. Or as if she were afraid letting him get too close to her would lead to his death, as well.

Honor brought only an old Foreign Office hand, an intelligence specialist, and her aide.

And then there was Nimitz . . . quite possibly the deadliest "armed retainer" of them all. Certainly he was on a kilo-for-kilo basis, at any rate! And it was obvious from the taste of the Havenites' mind glows that every one of these people had been briefed on the reports of the treecats' intelligence, telempathic abilities, and lethality.

Just as it was equally obvious that several of them—who rejoiced in names like McGwire, Younger, and Tullingham—cherished profound reservations about allowing him within a kilometer of this conference room. In fact, McGwire was so unhappy that Honor had to wonder how Pritchart had managed to twist his arm hard enough to get him here at all.

And Nimitz of course, a small revolution in diplomacy treecats are. Even if Honor has all the same powers herself, no one knows that, and the conservatives at the table are all deeply unhappy, I'm thinking more because of Nimitz's empathic abilities than his claws.

Nouveau Paris had been built in the foothills of the Limoges Mountains, the coastal range that marked the southwest edge of the continent of Rochambeau where it met the Veyret Ocean. The city's pastel colored towers rose high into the heavens, but despite their height—and, for that matter, the sheer size and population of the city itself—the towering peaks of the Limoges Range still managed to put them into proportion. To remind the people living in them that a planet was a very large place.

Like most cities designed and planned by a gravitic civilization's engineers, Nouveau Paris incorporated green belts, parks, and tree-shaded pedestrian plazas. It also boasted spectacular beaches along its westernmost suburbs, but the heart of the original city been built around the confluence of the Garronne River and the Rhône River, and from her place at the table, she looked almost directly down to where those two broad streams merged less than half a kilometer before they plunged over the eighty-meter, horseshoe-shaped drop of Frontenac Falls in a boiling smother of foam, spray, and mist. Below the falls which had given the Plaza Falls' its name, the imposing width of the Frontenac Estuary rolled far more tranquilly to the Veyret, dotted with pleasure boats which were themselves yet another emblem of the Republic of Haven's renaissance. It was impressive, even from the suite's imposing height.

And the city of Nouveau Paris, a fair bit from the "crumbling concrete jungle" of the Legislaturist days, and a far nicer mental picture of the place than I ever had.


Anyways Prichart suggests they try to keep things casual, no need to get overly caught up in protocol or tiptoe around each others' sensibilities. Then asks Honor to communicate Elizabeth's message and sketch out the basics of Manticore's starting position.

"As I've already told President Pritchart, both my Queen and I are fully aware that the view of who's truly responsible for the conflict between our two star nations isn't the same from Manticore and Haven. I've also already conceded to President Pritchart that the High Ridge Government must bear its share of blame for the diplomatic failure which led to the resumption of hostilities between our star nations. I think, however, that no one in Nouveau Paris, anymore than anyone in Landing, can deny that the Republic of Haven actually fired the first shots of this round when it launched Operation Thunderbolt. I'm confident the decision to do so was not lightly taken, and I don't doubt for a moment that you felt, rightly or wrongly, both that you were justified and that it was the best of the several bad options available to you. But the fact remains that Manticore didn't start the shooting in any of our conflicts with Haven.

"Nonetheless, ladies and gentlemen, we've come to a crossroads. I know some of you blame the Star Empire for all that's happened. I assure you, there are more than sufficient people in the Star Empire who blame the Republic for all that's happened. And the truth, of course, is that both sides must bear their own share of the responsibility. Yet at this moment, the Star Empire's military advantage is, quite frankly, overwhelming."

They weren't liking what they were hearing; that much was painfully obvious to her empathic sense, despite their impressive control of their faces. But she also tasted the bleak awareness that what she'd just said was self-evidently true. It was strongest from Pritchart and Theisman, but she tasted a surprisingly strong flare of the same awareness from Nesbitt. Montreau and Bourchier clearly recognized the same unpalatable truth, but there was something different, less personal about their recognition than Honor tasted in Nesbitt's.

Younger, on the other hand, seemed to be one of those people who were constitutionally incapable of accepting the very possibility of failure. It was as if he was able to intellectually recognize that Apollo gave the Manticoran Alliance a huge military advantage yet unable to accept the corollary that he could no longer "game" his way to the outcome he wanted.

McGwire and Tullingham, unlike Younger, clearly did recognize how severely the tectonic shift in military power limited their options, but that didn't mean they were prepared to give up. She suspected they'd be willing to bow to the inevitable, in the end, but only after they'd cut the best personal deals they could.

Honor states the obvious, followed by reaction shots from all the Havenite delegates. This is going to be fun...

"I would be lying to you, ladies and gentlemen," she resumed finally, "if I didn't admit that the Manticorans who would prefer to see the final and permanent destruction of the Republic of Haven probably outnumber those who would prefer any other outcome. And I'm sure there are any number of Havenites who feel exactly the same way about the Star Empire after so many years of warfare and destruction.

"But vengeance begets vengeance." Her voice was soft, her brown, almond-shaped eyes very level as they swept the faces of the Havenites. "Destruction can be a 'final solution' only when that destruction is complete and total. When there's no one left on the other side—will never be anyone left on the other side—to seek their own vengeance. Surely history offers endless examples of that basic, unpalatable truth. Rome had 'peace' with Carthage back on Old Terra in the end, but only when Carthage had been not simply defeated, but totally destroyed. And no one in the Star Empire is foolish enough to believe we can 'totally destroy' the Republic of Haven. Whatever we do, wherever the Star Empire and the Republic go from this point, there will still be people on both sides who identify themselves as Manticoran or Havenite and remember what the other side did to them, and no military advantage lasts forever. Admiral Theisman and Admiral Foraker demonstrated that quite clearly two or three T-years ago, and I assure you that we in the Star Empire learned the lesson well."

Looks like the peace talks aren't super-popular back home, which makes sense. Like Honor said, Manticore has been fighting or preparing to fight Haven for over sixty years, even if a segment of the population managed to remain in denial until Haven had actually attacked. Haven has been the juggernaut that was going to crush them for so many years, until Manticore was winning victory after victory, followed by crapping themselves after Icarus, followed by Buttercup and "peace" of a sort that ended five years later through Havenite treachery. And that's before Haven offered a peace conference that derailed when "they" assinated Webster ad tried to kill Berry and Ruth. The Manty on the street probably has complicated, but very bad feelings associated with the word 'Haven.'


Honor goes on to explain that of course this won't be quick or easy, but if these talks fail her orders, the best out of a great many bad options, is to dismantle Haven's military and industry to the point it will be several decades before they can threaten Manticore again.

[VhenRa]

That will also be incredibly time-consuming. They still have to find Bolthole after-all because from the implied scale of the operation, even if they destroy every other shipyard complex Haven possesses... Bolthole can likely build them an entire new navy inside of a decade, thousand odd ships of the wall included.

[Batman]

Bolthole could probably do so with the Republic of Haven intact. Somebody has to pay for those ships and supply the material they're built from and at this point in the narrative Honor absolutely is in a position to dismantle Haven's entire industrial base with impunity even if she can't just force a surrender by taking apart the Haven system itself.

[VhenRa]

Bolthole could probably do so with the Republic of Haven intact. Somebody has to pay for those ships and supply the material they're built from and at this point in the narrative Honor absolutely is in a position to dismantle Haven's entire industrial base with impunity even if she can't just force a surrender by taking apart the Haven system itself.

From the description of Bolthole, its a self-contained industrial system. No materials supplied from elsewhere, from Step 1 to Step "Finished SDP", all the raw materials and construction work occurs in it's system.

[Batman]

Even if we assume this to be true (and I 'do' recall mentions of Bolthole, at least initially, using parts prefabricated elsewhere), who exactly is going to pay the people working there with the Republic having its industrial base turned to ashes/having surrendered?

[Ahriman238]

It wasn't that Oversteegen had anything other than the highest respect for Michelle Henke. It was just that she'd always been so aggressive in stamping on anything that even looked like the operation of nepotism in her behalf. Oh, if she'd been incompetent, or even only marginally competent, he'd have agreed with her. The use of family influence in support of self-interest and mediocrity (or worse) was the single greatest weakness of an aristocratic system, and Oversteegen had studied more than enough history to admit it. But every social system had weaknesses of one sort or another, and the Manticoran system was an aristocratic one. Making that system work required a recognition of social responsibility on the part of those at its apex, and Oversteegen had no patience with those—like his own miserable excuse for an uncle, Michael Janvier, the Baron of High Ridge—who saw their lofty births solely in terms of their own advantage. But it also required the effective use of the advantages of birth and position to promote merit. To see to it that those who were capable of discharging their responsibilities, and willing to do so, received the preference to let them get on with it.

He was willing to concede that the entire system disproportionately favored those who enjoyed the patronage and family influence in question, and that was unfortunate. One of those weaknesses every system had. But he wasn't going to pretend he didn't see those advantages as a rightful possession of those who met their obligations under it . . . including, especially, the enormous obligation to see to it that those advantages were employed on behalf of others, in support of the entire society which provided them, not simply for their own personal benefit or the sort of shortsighted class selfishness of which aristocrats like his uncle (or, for that matter, his own father) were altogether too often guilty . In particular, one of the responsibilities of any naval officer was to identify and groom his own successors, and Oversteegen saw no reason he shouldn't use his influence to nurture the careers of capable subordinates, be they ever so commonly born. It wasn't as if being born into the aristocracy magically guaranteed some sort of innate superiority, and one of the greater strengths of the Manticoran system from its inception had been the relative ease with which capable commoners could find themselves elevated to its aristocracy.

Mike ought t' recognize that if anyone does, he reflected, given that her best friend in th' galaxy is also th' most spectacular example I can think of of how it works. When it works, of course. Be fair, Michael—it doesn't always, and you know it as well as Mike does.

Michael Oversteegen, as our one likable Manty conservative ruminates on Manticore's hereditary aristocracy.

Her own smile faded at the thought. None of her ships currently had Apollo, nor did they have the Keyhole-Two platforms to make use of the FTL telemetry link even if they'd had the Apollo birds themselves. But unless she missed her guess, that was going to change very soon now.

The fruits of Apollo haven't yet made their way to Talbott.

The first wave of Solarian newsies had reached Spindle via the Junction nine days earlier, and they'd arrived in a feeding frenzy. although Michelle herself had managed to avoid them by taking refuge in her genuine responsibilities as Tenth Fleet's commanding officer. She'd retreated to her orbiting flagship and hidden behind operational security and several hundred kilometers of airless vacuum—and Artemis' Marine detachment—to keep the pack from pursuing her.

Yeah, I hadn't even thought that the League might send their own journalists to get the Manties', and New Tuscans' take on events.

And just to make her happiness complete, the insufferable gadflies were bringing their own reports of the Solarian League's reaction to what had happened along with them. Well, the Old Terran reaction, at least, she corrected herself. But the version of the "truth" expounded on Old Terra—and the reaction to it on Old Terra—always played a hugely disproportionate part in the League's policies.

And it was evident that Old Terra and the deeply entrenched bureaucracies headquartered there were not reacting well.

"As goes Earth, so goes the Solarian League?"

. But as of the last statements by Prime Minister Gyulay, Foreign Minister Roelas y Valiente, and Defense Minister Taketomo which had so far reached Spindle, the League's official position was that it was "awaiting independent confirmation of the Star Empire of Manticore's very serious allegations" and considering "appropriate responses to the Royal Manticoran Navy's destruction of SLNS Jean Bart and her entire crew."

While Roelas y Valiente had "deeply deplored" any loss of life suffered in the first "alleged incident" between units of the Solarian League Navy and the Royal Manticoran Navy in the neutral system of New Tuscany, his government had, of course, been unable to make any formal response to the Star Empire's protest and demand for explanations at that time. The Solarian League would, equally of course, "respond appropriately" as soon as there'd been time for "reliable and impartial" reports of both the "alleged incidents" to reach Old Terra. In the meantime, the Solarian League "sincerely regretted" its inability to respond directly to the "purported facts" of the "alleged incidents." And however deeply the foreign minister might have "deplored" any loss of life, he'd been very careful to point out that even by Manticoran accounts, the Solarian League had lost far more lives than Manticore had. And that that Solarian loss of life had occurred only after "what would appear to be the hasty response of a perhaps overly aggressive Manticoran flag officer to initial reports of a purported incident which had not at that time been independently confirmed for her."

The official response and announcements from the talking heads that theoretically run the Solarian League. Not that anyone will be considering Gyulay's opinion of any importance.

On the surface, "waiting for independent confirmation" sounded very judicial and correct, but Michelle—unlike the vast number of Solarians listening to the public statements of the men and women who theoretically governed them—knew the League government already had Evelyn Sigbee's official report on what had happened in both the "New Tuscany Incidents." The fact that the people who supposedly ran that government were still referring to what they knew from their own flag officer's report was the truth as "allegations" was scarcely encouraging. And the fact that they were considering "appropriate responses" to Jean Bart's destruction by an "overly aggressive Manticoran flag officer" and not addressing even the possibility of appropriate responses to Josef Byng's murder of three Manticoran destroyers and every man and woman who'd served upon them struck her as even less promising. At the very least, as far as she could see, all of that was a depressing indication that the idiots calling the shots behind the smokescreen of their elected superiors were still treating this all as business as usual. And if that really was their attitude . . . .

It really does take them an immense time to even pretend-respond to outside events, doesn't it?

In theory, at least, Verrochio—as the Office of Frontier Security's commissioner in the Madras Sector—was Byng's superior, but pinning down exactly who was really in charge of what could get a bit slippery once the Sollies' dueling bureaucracies got into the act. That was always true, especially out here in the Verge, and from her own experience with Josef Byng, it might be even truer than usual this time around. It was entirely possible that everything which had happened in New Tuscany, and even his decision to move his command there in the first place, had been his own half-assed idea.

Figuring out authority and jurisdiction between the many agencies of the Solarian League is a headache and a half, if not a full-time job.

When the first of the Solarian news crews reached Spindle, it had been obvious there was already plenty of blood in the water as far as they were concerned, even though they'd headed out for the Talbott Quadrant before the League had gotten around to issuing a formal press release about what had happened to Jean Bart. They'd arrived armed with the Manticoran reports of events, but that wasn't the same thing, by a long chalk. And the Solarian accounts and editorials which had accompanied the follow-on wave that had departed after the official League statements (such as they were and what there was of them) were filled with mingled indignation, anger, outrage, and alarm, but didn't seem to contain very much in the way of reasoned response.

Michelle knew it wasn't fair to expect anything else out of them, given the fact that all of this had come at them cold. Not yet, at any rate. And so far, none of the 'fax stories from the League which had reached Spindle had contained a single solid fact provided by any official Solarian source. Every official statement the Solly newsies had to go on was coming from Manticore, and even without the ingrained arrogance the League's reporters shared in full with their fellow citizens, it wouldn't have been reasonable for them to accept the Manticoran version without a healthy dose of skepticism. At the same time, though, it seemed glaringly evident that the majority of the Solly media's talking heads and pundits were being fed carefully crafted leaks from inside the League bureaucracy and the SLN. Manticore's competing talking heads and pundits weren't being leaked additional information, but that was mainly because there was no need to. They were basing their analyses on the facts available in the public record courtesy of the Star Empire of Manticore which, unlike the Solly leaks, had the at least theoretical advantage of actually being the truth, as well. Not that many of Old Terra's journalists and editorialists seemed aware of that minor distinction.

How this is playing in the Solly media. Also the longstanding Solly tradition where little to nothing is said officially, but "informed sources" speaking on condition of anonymity still manage to spread the government line.

It was all looking even messier than Michelle had feared it might, but at least the Manticoran version was being thoroughly aired. And, for that matter, she knew the Manticoran version was actually spreading throughout the League faster than the so-called response emerging from Old Chicago. The Star Empire's commanding position in the wormhole networks could move things other than cargo ships, she thought grimly.

A lot of places in the League are hearing Manticore's side of the story first, which was to their advantage during the Haven Wars too. However, it's unclear if that will be enough advantage given the "neobarbs" are now contradicting the League's version of events.

At the same time Elizabeth had dispatched her second diplomatic note to Old Terra, the Admiralty had issued an advisory to all Manticoran shipping, alerting the Star Empire's innumerable merchant skippers to the suddenly looming crisis. It would take weeks for that advisory to reach all of them, but given the geometry of the wormhole network, it was still likely it would reach almost all of them before any instructions from the League reached the majority of its local naval commanders. And along with the open advisory for the merchies, the same dispatch boats had carried secret instructions to every RMN station commander and the senior officer of every RMN escort force . . . and those instructions had been a formal war warning.

Michelle devoutly hoped it was a warning about a war which would never move beyond the realm of unrealized possibility, but if it did, the Royal Manticoran Navy's officers' orders were clear. If they or any Manticoran merchant ship in their areas of responsibility were attacked, they were to respond with any level of force necessary to defeat that attack, no matter who the attackers might be. In the meantime, they were also instructed to expedite the return of Manticoran merchant shipping to Manticore-dominated space, despite the fact that the withdrawal of those merchant ships from their customary runs might well escalate the sense of crisis and confrontation.

Manticore has sent a war warning to all stations, and advised their vast and far-flung merchant marine to expedite their departure from Solarian space.

She'd received at least some reinforcements, she'd shortstopped the four CLACs of Carrier Division 7.1 on her own authority when Rear Admiral Stephen Enderby turned up in Spindle. Enderby had expected to deliver his LACs to Prairie, Celebrant, and Nuncio, then head home for another load, and the LAC crews had expected nothing more challenging than a little piracy suppression. That, obviously, had changed. Enderby had been more than willing to accept his new orders, and his embarked LACs had been busy practicing for a somewhat more demanding role. She expected her decision to retain them for Tenth Fleet to be approved, as soon as the official paperwork could catch up, and the arrival of another division of Saganami-Cs had been a pleasant surprise—in more ways than one, given its commanding officer. For that matter, still more weight of metal was in the pipeline, although the original plans for the Talbott Quadrant were still recovering from the shock of the Battle of Manticore.

Four carriers have been added to Michelle Henke's Tenth Fleet, diverted from their mission to deliver an LAC wing to each of four Talbott systems and return home for more. Plus Commodore Terekhov's short cruiser squadron.

She had absolute confidence in her command's ability to defeat any attack Frontier Fleet might launch against Spindle. They'd have to transfer in scores of additional battlecruisers if they hoped to have any chance against her own Nikes, Saganami-Cs, Enderby's CLACs, and the flatpack missile pods aboard her ammunition ships. In fact, she doubted Frontier Fleet had enough battlecruisers anywhere this side of Sol itself to take Spindle, even if they could send every one of them to call on her, and battlecruisers were the heaviest ships Frontier Fleet had. But Battle Fleet was another matter, and if the New Tuscans had been right about Solly superdreadnoughts at McIntosh. . . .

Holding a system against any number of BCs is trivial, compared to 60-70 SDs.

"May I help you, Lieutenant?"

The exquisitely tailored maître d' didn't sound as if he really expected to be able to assist two such junior officers, who'd undoubtedly strayed into his establishment by mistake.

"Oh, yes—please! We're here to join Lieutenant Archer," Abigail Hearns told him. "Um, we may be a few minutes early, I'm afraid."

She managed, Ensign Helen Zilwicki observed to sound very . . . earnest. Possibly even a little nervous at intruding into such elegant surroundings, but very determined. And the fact that her father could have bought the entire Sigourney's Fine Restaurants chain out of pocket change wasn't particularly in evidence, either. The fact that she was third-generation prolong and looked considerably younger than her already very young age, especially to eyes not yet accustomed to the latest generations of prolong, undoubtedly helped, yet she clearly possessed a fair degree of thespian talent, as well. The maître d' was clearly convinced she'd escaped from a high school—probably a lower-class high school, given her soft, slow Grayson accent—for the afternoon, at least. His expression of politely sophisticated attentiveness didn't actually change a millimeter, but Helen had the distinct impression of an internal wince.

Ah yes, Sigourney's. I didn't include it earlier but Gwen Archer, Mike's Flag Lieutenant has an absolute zeal for one of the finer dining establishments, and certainly the snootiest, on Spindle. He particularly enjoys fantasizing about the day they learn the mere lieutenant and friends they quietly sneer down on are so privileged. Gwen himself is a distant cousin to the Queen of Manticore, Helen Zilwicki is the loving stepdaughter of one of Manticore's wealthiest nobles and adopted sister to the Queen of Torch, and Abigail Hearns comes from a wealthy Grayson Steading. They all enjoy winding up the staff a bit much.

They crossed to a low archway on the opposite side of the big room, then followed him down two shallow steps into a dining room with quite a different (though no less expensive) flavor. The floor had turned into artfully worn bricks, the walls—also of brick—had a rough, deliberately unfinished look, and the ceiling was supported by heavy wooden beams.

Well, by what looked like wooden beams, Helen thought, although they probably weren't all that impressive to someone like Abigail who'd grown up in a (thoroughly renovated) medieval pile of stone over six hundred years old. One which really did have massive, age-blackened beams, a front gate fit to sneer at battering rams, converted firing slits for windows, and fireplaces the size of a destroyer's boat bay.

Either a destroyer's boat bay is incredibly tiny, those fireplaces are huge or, most likely of all, Helen needs to get a handle on her hyperbole.

"I didn't say it did," Helga Boltitz, Defense Minister Henri Krietzmann's personal aide, replied, and smiled at the newcomers. "Hello, Abigail. And you too, Helen."

And Helga, aide to the Talbott Quadrant's Defense Minister and Gwen's sort-of girlfriend.

Abigail shook her head. She'd spent more time on Manticore than she had back home on Grayson, over the last nine or ten T-years, but despite the undeniable, mischievous enjoyment she'd felt when dissembling for the maître d', there were times when she still found her Manticoran friends' attitude towards their own aristocracy peculiar. As Gervais had pointed out, her father was a steadholder, and the deepest longings of the most hard-boiled member of Manticore's Conservative Association were but pale shadows of the reality of a steadholder's authority within his steading. The term "absolute monarch" fell comfortably short of that reality, although "supreme autocrat" was probably headed in the right direction.

As a result of her own birth and childhood, she had remarkably few illusions about the foibles and shortcomings of the "nobly born." Yet she was also the product of a harsh and unforgiving planet and a profoundly traditional society, one whose deference and rules of behavior were based deep in the bedrock of survival's imperatives. She still found the irreverent, almost fondly mocking attitude of so many Manticorans towards their own aristocracy unsettling. In that respect, she was even more like Helga than Helen was, she thought. Hostility, antagonism, even hatred—those she could understand, when those born to positions of power abused that power rather than meeting its responsibilities. The sort of self-deprecating amusement someone like Gwen Archer displayed, on the other hand, didn't fit itself comfortably into her own core concepts, even though she'd seen exactly the same attitude out of dozens of other Manticorans who were at least as well born as he was.

There's still sometimes little cultural disconnects between Manticorans and Graysons, even for Abby who went through the Island and has served aboard three Manticoran starships and exactly zero Grayson ones. Among these are the lack of respect/self-deprecation of Manticoran aristocrats. Probably because on Manticore the aristos can't order their armsman to haul jokers off and beat them.

"Well, fair's fair," Helen said judiciously. They all looked at her, and she shrugged. "Maybe it's because I've spent so much time watching Cathy Montaigne maneuver back home, but it occurs to me that having Thimble crawling with newsies may be the best thing that could happen."

"Just how do you mean that?" Gervais asked. In the wrong tone, the question could have been dismissive, especially given the difference in their ages and relative senority. As it was, he sounded genuinely curious, and she shrugged again.

"Politics is all about perceptions and understandings. I realize Cathy Montaigne's mainly involved in domestic politics right now, but the same basic principle applies in interstellar diplomacy. If you control the terms of the debate, the advantage is all on your side. You can't make somebody on the other side make the decision you want, but you've got a much better chance of getting her to do that if she's got to defend her position in the public mind instead of you having to defend your position. Controlling the information—and especially the public perception of that information—is one of the best ways to limit her options to the ones most favorable to your own needs. Don't forget, if the Sollies want a formal declaration of war, all it takes is one veto by a full member star system to stop them. That's a pretty significant prize for a PR campaign to go after. And, at the moment, the way we want to control the debate is simply to tell the truth about what happened at New Tuscany, right?"

Gervais nodded, and she shrugged a third time.

"Well, if all the newsies in the universe are here in Spindle getting our side of the story, looking at the sensor data we've released, and interviewing our people, that's what's going to be being reported back on Old Terra. They can try to spin it any way they want, but the basic message getting sent back to all those Sollies—even by their own newsies—is going to be built on what they're finding out here, from us."

Fair enough. Not like anything can be done anyways, if you try and remove the foreign reporters they'll just turn on you.

"The people who worked this stuff out in the first place named the moves, not me! According to Master Tye, they were influenced by some old entertainment recordings. Something called 'movies.'"

"Oh, Tester!" Abigail shook her head. "Forget I said a thing!"

"What?" Helen looked confused, and Abigail snorted.

"Up until Lady Harrington did some research back home in Manticore—I think she even queried the library computers in Beowulf and on Old Terra, as a matter of fact—nobody on Grayson had ever actually seen the movies our ancestors apparently based their notions of swordplay on. Now, unfortunately, we have. And fairness requires that I admit most of the 'samurai movies' were at least as silly as anything the Neue-Stil people could have been watching."

"Well, my ancestors certainly never indulged in anything that foolish," Gervais said with an air of unbearable superiority.

"Want to bet?" Abigail inquired with a dangerous smile.

"Why?" he asked distrustfully.

"Because if I remember correctly, your ancestors came from Old North America—from the Western Hemisphere, at least—just like mine did."

"And?"

"And while Lady Harrington was doing her research on samurai movies, she got some cross hits to something called 'cowboy movies.' So she brought them along, too. In fact, she got her uncle and his friends in the SCA involved in putting together a 'movie festival' in Harrington Steading. Quite a few of those movies were made in a place called Hollywood, which also happens to have been in Old North America. Some of them were actually darned good, but others—" She shuddered. "Trust me, your ancestors and mine apparently had . . . erratic artistic standards, let's say."

Not a high opinion of cinema in the future, it seems. Harrington Steading is oddball in another way, they have a film festival.

"That's all very interesting, I'm sure," Gervais said briskly, "but it's leading us astray from the truly important focus we ought to be maintaining on current events."

"In other words," Helga told Abigail, "he's losing the argument, so he's changing the rules."

"Maybe he is," Helen said. "No, scratch that—he definitely is. Still, he may have a point. It's not like any of us are going to be in a position to make any earth shattering decisions, but between us, we're working for several people who will be. Under the circumstances, I don't think it would hurt a bit for us to share notes. Nothing confidential, but the kind of general background stuff that might let me answer one of the Commodore's questions without his having to get hold of someone in Minister Krietzmann's office or someone on Lady Gold Peak's staff, for instance."

The four agree to share information for the benefit of all. Now they just need a snazzy group name that downplays their flunky status.

He sat once more upon MANS Mako's flag bridge. Beyond the flagship's hull, fourteen more ships of Task Group 1.1, kept perfect formation upon her, and the brilliant beacon of Manticore-A blazed before them. They were only one light-week from that star, now, and they'd decelerated to only twenty percent of light-speed. This was the point for which they'd been headed ever since leaving Mesa four T-months before. Now it was time to do what they'd come here to do.

"Begin deployment," he said, and the enormous hatches opened and the pods began to spill free.

The six units of Task Group 1.2 were elsewhere, under Rear Admiral Lydia Papnikitas, closing on Manticore-B. They wouldn't be deploying their pods just yet, not until they'd reached their own preselected launch point. Topolev wished he'd had more ships to commit to that prong of the attack, but the decision to move up Oyster Bay had dictated the available resources, and this prong had to be decisive. Besides, there were fewer targets in the Manticore-B subsystem, anyway, and the planners had had to come up with the eight additional Shark-class ships for Admiral Colenso's Task Group 2.1's Grayson operation from somewhere.

MAN Task Force 1.1 deploys their pods, letting them move in system at a leisurely 0.2 c until they reach firing range in about a month. 15 podlaying spider drive Sharks in 1.1, hitting the Manticore primary system. Hephaestus and Vulcan. 6 more ships hitting Weyland, at least 8 more for Grayson.

Investigative journalism of the bareknuckled, no-holds-barred, take-no-prisoners style O'Hanrahan practiced was considerably less lucrative than other possible media careers. Or, at least, it was for serious journalists; there was always a market for the sensationalist "investigative reporter" who was willing to shoulder the task of providing an incredibly jaded public with fresh, outrageous titillation. O'Hanrahan, however, had always avoided that particular branch of the human race's third oldest profession. The daughter and granddaughter of respected journalists, she'd proven she took her own reportorial responsibilities seriously from the very beginning, and she'd quickly gained a reputation as one of those rare birds: a newsy whose sources were always rock solid, who genuinely attempted to cover her stories fairly . . . and who never backed away from a fight.

She'd picked a lot of those fights with the cheerfulness of a David singling out Goliaths, and she'd always been an equal opportunity stone-slinger. Her pieces had skewered the bureaucratic reality behind the representative façade of the Solarian League for years, and she'd never hesitated to denounce the sweetheart deals the Office of Frontier Security was fond of cutting with Solarian transstellars. Just to be fair, she'd done more than a few stories about the close (and lucrative) connections so many serior members of the Renaissance Association maintained with the very power structure it was officially so devoted to reforming from the ground up, as well. And she'd done a series on the supposedly outlawed genetic slave trade which was so devastating—and had named enough specific names—that there were persistent rumors Manpower had put a sizable bounty on her head.

She'd also been one of the first Solarian journalists to report the Manticoran allegations of what had happened at Monica, and although she was no Manticoran apologist, she'd made it clear to her viewers and readers that the waters in Monica were very murky indeed. And as Amanda Corvisart showed the Solarian news media the overwhelming evidence of Manpower's and Technodyne's involvement, she'd reported that, too.

Meet Audrey O'Harahan, a hard-hitting journalist of impeccable integrity, from a line of such journalists. Also a Mesan Alpha line, part of a group seeded three generations ago to build up just such a reputation so they'd be absolutely trusted down the line when Mesa would really need to plant a story. Her slamming of Manpower in the events surrounding Monica in particular protect her from ever being labeled a Mesan shill.

Considering all this chapter is two deep-cover generational Mesan agents mugging for the cameras and creating a well-documented trail for the story Mesa is planting, I see no need to include most of it.

"Because the person he's supposed to deliver it to is over at the Office of Naval Intelligence, but his immediate boss—somebody in the New Tuscan government; I couldn't get him to tell me who, but I figure it's got to be somebody from their security services—doesn't want the Navy to go public with it," Juppé said. "They want it in official hands, because it doesn't track with the Manties' version of the story, but they're asking the Navy to keep things quiet until Frontier Fleet can get reinforcements deployed to protect them from the Manties."

"According to the Manties, they don't have any big quarrel with New Tuscany," O'Hanrahan pointed out. "They've never accused the New Tuscans of firing on their ships."

"I know. But, like I say, this stuff doesn't match what Manticore's been saying. In fact, the courier let me copy what's supposed to be the New Tuscan Navy's raw sensor records of the initial incident. And according to those records, the Manty ships were not only light cruisers, instead of destroyers, but they fired first, before Admiral Byng opened fire on them."

And there we go, Juppe has a 'contact' a New Tuscan courier arrived by way of the Mesa/Visigoth wormhole with sensor records of Manty ships at the New Tuscany Incident firing first. These records contain official authentication codes, and as the product of the finest Mesan studios are prepared to hold up to all manner of close scrutiny. After verification, these will be released to the Solly public by their most trusted new source, someone who has shown time and again that she will not be bought or bullied off a story, who would never sell out or plant such extraordinary evidence. All as planned.

Now he had been, and he thought fondly of the recording he'd made of his conversation with O'Hanrahan. It probably wasn't the only record of it, of course. He knew she had one, and despite all of the guarantees of privacy built into the League Constitution, an enormous amount of public and private surveillance went on, especially here in Old Chicago. It was entirely possible—even probable—that somewhere in the bowels of the Gendarmerie someone had decided keeping tabs on Audrey O'Hanrahan's com traffic would be a good idea. It would certainly make plenty of sense from their perspective, given how often and how deeply she'd embarrassed the Solly bureaucracies with her reporting. But that was fine with Juppé. In this case, the more records the better, since they would make it abundantly clear to any impartial observer that he'd done his very best to verify the story which had come so unexpectedly into his hands. And they would make it equally abundantly clear that O'Hanrahan hadn't known a thing about it until he'd brought it to her attention. Not to mention the fact that she was no knee-jerk anti-Manty . . . and that she'd been suspicious as hell when she heard about his scoop.

And establishing those points was, after all, the exact reason he'd screened her in the first place instead of simply very quietly delivering the information to her in person.

Apparently right to privacy is enshrined in the League Constitution, and generally ignored as everyone spies on/records everyone else. Hence the whole charade to give the planted story a pedigree.

But what he hadn't known until this very day—because he'd had no need to know—was that just as his own career and public persona, hers, too, had been a mask she showed the rest of the galaxy. And now that he knew the truth, and despite the envy that still lingered, Juppé admitted to himself that he doubted he could have matched her bravura performance. Gamma line or no, there was no way he could have equaled the performance of an alpha line like the O'Hanrahan genotype.

So there is a definite hierarchy even in the top ranks.

[Laguna]

And so she sat still in the comfortable seat, pretending she was unaware of the mesmerized gaze the Havenite flight engineer had turned upon her as he came face to face with the woman even the Havenite newsies called "the Salamander," and hoped she'd been right about Pritchart and her administration.

Really? It's a stupid nickname, but even more so for her enemies to use.

A small thing, but I too was confused about the whole "Salamander" nickname for Honor, until I found out it's from the the name of the closest planet to Manticore-A (a Mercury equivalent), and not the actual animal. That explains the "always where the fire is hottest" line. I don't think this was ever mentioned in any of the books, hence the "WTF?!" reaction.

[Terralthra]

And so she sat still in the comfortable seat, pretending she was unaware of the mesmerized gaze the Havenite flight engineer had turned upon her as he came face to face with the woman even the Havenite newsies called "the Salamander," and hoped she'd been right about Pritchart and her administration.

Really? It's a stupid nickname, but even more so for her enemies to use.

A small thing, but I too was confused about the whole "Salamander" nickname for Honor, until I found out it's from the the name of the closest planet to Manticore-A (a Mercury equivalent), and not the actual animal. That explains the "always where the fire is hottest" line. I don't think this was ever mentioned in any of the books, hence the "WTF?!" reaction.

Like the other planets in the Manticore binary system, it's named for a mythological creature.

[Simon_Jester]

Well, having the Manticoran version of Mercury be named "Salamander" would help to explain why the term is floating around on everyone's mental radar as a nickname for a person who's constantly getting into big energetic events. It'd be weird but not weirder than a lot of things that people get called in real life.

[Kingmaker]

There was a real British soldier from WW I/II nicknamed "Salamander", which is probably where Weber got it from.

The main thing we need right now (and I apologize to Weber if this in Distant Thunder or Shadow of Freedom) is an infodump on Beowulf, Mesa, their mutual history and their goals.

Convenient! (Scroll to the bottom for the Mesa section; bioscience section is also helpful). Obviously not an 'in-universe' source, but it does give a fairly detailed account of why Mesa and Beowulf hate each other. Doesn't give much of an explanation for the airtight, multi-generational "take-over-the-world" conspiracy, though.

[VhenRa]

There was a real British soldier from WW I/II nicknamed "Salamander", which is probably where Weber got it from.

I am insulted. He was a New Zealander dammit! But yeah, Bernard Freyberg, 1st Baron Freyberg

[Simon_Jester]

A fair amount of exposition has made it into the books somewhere, I think, but it has frustratingly not been infodumped even while other less worthy things have.

[Ahriman238]

The main thing we need right now (and I apologize to Weber if this in Distant Thunder or Shadow of Freedom) is an infodump on Beowulf, Mesa, their mutual history and their goals.

Convenient! (Scroll to the bottom for the Mesa section; bioscience section is also helpful). Obviously not an 'in-universe' source, but it does give a fairly detailed account of why Mesa and Beowulf hate each other. Doesn't give much of an explanation for the airtight, multi-generational "take-over-the-world" conspiracy, though.

I have in fact read the bits you're thinking of some time ago, and walked away feeling distinctly unsatisfied. Besides which, I shouldn't have to trawl through the Baen forums to understand key parts of Weber's books, they should be able to support themselves.

[Simon_Jester]

Even if we assume this to be true (and I 'do' recall mentions of Bolthole, at least initially, using parts prefabricated elsewhere), who exactly is going to pay the people working there with the Republic having its industrial base turned to ashes/having surrendered?

For Bolthole's location to remain reliably secret it really should have at least some infrastructure for extracting raw materials. Even if this infrastructure isn't up to massive wartime-industrial buildup it should exist. Moreover, resource extraction seems to be relatively easy portable industrial technology for the Honorverse; if there isn't any at Bolthole it would be far and away the easiest link in the industrial chain to repair.

So honestly, yes, if Bolthole isn't touched then Haven will be able to build a new battlefleet a LOT faster than would otherwise be the case, even if the rest of their economy is in the toilet.

As to finding it, once you are operating freely throughout Havenite space, well. There are about 47 star systems within a 16.5 light-year radius of Sol, most of them tiny dim red dwarfs (which could still host something like Bolthole). The Republic of Haven occupies a roughly spherical volume about 200 light years in radius. Assuming that Pierre was too smart to establish his top-secret installation anywhere close to the line between Haven and Manticore (which the Havenites would have to worry about Manticore stumbling on by blind luck)... that takes out about 15% to 20% of Haven's total volume as 'acceptable' places to put Bolthole. Aaand...

Okay, the radius of the Republic is roughly 12 times that 16.5 light-year bubble. Volume of a sphere scales with the radius cubed, so the Republic contains about 1728 times the volume of that bubble- cutting out the inaccessible chunk, let's round down to, oh, 1400 is about 80% of 1728, and a nice round number to play with. So 1400 bubbles each containing, say, 40 to 50 stars... you're looking at about 56000 to 70000 star systems in Havenite space.

Even given that the RMN could task hundreds of ships to sweep Havenite space, it could take years to find Bolthole that way. Decades, even. The RMN might well benefit from inventing a whole new class of cheap frigate or destroyer specifically to sweep all those star systems looking for Bolthole.

And I really, really wouldn't consider the Republic down for the count while Bolthole stands.

[Batman]

I never said a word about the Manties finding Bolthole, I'm dubious about its ability to function with the rest of the Republic being in shambles/under Manticoran control, at least for more than a few months. We're not talking just resource extraction, that is indeed easy and those resources are to be had in abundance in pretty much every star system that actually has planets and/or asteroid belts. But we're talking about every step in between resource extraction and the final product. And that's a lot of steps that require a lot of industry that I don't think were a) ever mentioned in the books or b) would make sense for the Havenites to put in place unless they expected to get their asses handed to them and needed Bolthole to effectively function as a star nation of its own.

[Simon_Jester]

Well, remember that the function of Bolthole is to be effectively 'invisible.' Its location is to be kept secret. While it's certainly possible to keep Bolthole's location a secret while keeping up a steady stream of freighters moving in and out, it's going to be a lot harder. Especially in the new Republic of Haven, where it's actually legal for people to ask "uh, where are those freighters going" without being arbitrarily shot by the secret police.

So it would make tremendous sense for the Legislaturalists, the Committee, and the Republic to actually put in the time and effort to give Bolthole at least the beginnings of a complete, vertically integrated economy. We know something like this can be done in a decade or two because Grayson did it- they went from zero modern infrastructure (and having to import everything) to building their own capital ships in roughly ten T-years.

The only thing that would be needed is the space-trained workforce, and Haven could have supplied that.

Now, it might well be that for Bolthole to function at peak efficiency as a shipyard system, the Republic chose to ship in components from other systems rather than make them on site, allowing the Bolthole workforce to concentrate on building the maximum number of ships in the shortest possible time. But there would still almost have to be some degree of capability to function independently.

Or, if nothing else, for the Havenites to freak out and (as a go-to-hell plan) ship the necessary industrial equipment to Bolthole, from the secondary nodal systems that are about to get nuked by the RMN.

I mean, really, Manticore basically had the entire industrial chain from "steel ingots" to "this is a battleship" figured out and located on a single space station. There is no reason to assume Bolthole is incapable of duplicating that, even if it wouldn't operate at best efficiency while doing so.

[Kingmaker]

I have in fact read the bits you're thinking of some time ago, and walked away feeling distinctly unsatisfied. Besides which, I shouldn't have to trawl through the Baen forums to understand key parts of Weber's books, they should be able to support themselves.

Oh, I don't disagree. I actually think Weber's interaction with a subset of his forum-going fans is probably detrimental to the quality of the series, since I think that's one of the motivating factors behind why we get ten page infodumps on new missile drive technobabble, while one of the underlying conflicts of the series get marginal textual explanation. But it can be handy for added information (or it can reveal the explanation is dumber than anticipated).

While it's certainly possible to keep Bolthole's location a secret while keeping up a steady stream of freighters moving in and out, it's going to be a lot harder.

One question, I think, is how feasible it is to keep a ship's crew in the dark about where they are/where they are going. If every ship's captain or navigator gets a look at where Bolthole is, that's a lot of potential security holes, so you'd either need a large number of very trustworthy crews or a way of concealing the navigation data from the people who are supposed to use it. If that's doable somehow, external supply is less of a security issue.

[VhenRa]

I have in fact read the bits you're thinking of some time ago, and walked away feeling distinctly unsatisfied. Besides which, I shouldn't have to trawl through the Baen forums to understand key parts of Weber's books, they should be able to support themselves.

Oh, I don't disagree. I actually think Weber's interaction with a subset of his forum-going fans is probably detrimental to the quality of the series, since I think that's one of the motivating factors behind why we get ten page infodumps on new missile drive technobabble, while one of the underlying conflicts of the series get marginal textual explanation. But it can be handy for added information (or it can reveal the explanation is dumber than anticipated).

While it's certainly possible to keep Bolthole's location a secret while keeping up a steady stream of freighters moving in and out, it's going to be a lot harder.

One question, I think, is how feasible it is to keep a ship's crew in the dark about where they are/where they are going. If every ship's captain or navigator gets a look at where Bolthole is, that's a lot of potential security holes, so you'd either need a large number of very trustworthy crews or a way of concealing the navigation data from the people who are supposed to use it. If that's doable somehow, external supply is less of a security issue.

Well, there is one way. Have Freighter Convoy A travel to System X where it deposits it's cargo. After it leaves, Convoy B travels to System X from Bolthole, collects the cargo and then proceeds to return to Bolthole. The crews of Convoy B never actually travel to any system but System X and Bolthole. And of course the crews of Convoy A never actually travel to Bolthole. System X is of course uninhabited and after so and so the cargo transfer point is moved to System Y.

[Simon_Jester]

OK, that's clever.

I still think, though, that Bolthole would need at least some native construction capability, among other things to have built all the infrastructure it took just to become a mighty shipyard. I'm not saying they'd be able to continue warship production at 100% productivity, or maybe not even 10%, but given a fair chunk of time, even a minimal ability to extract resources and refine them would allow you to 'bootstrap' into a functioning shipyard.

[VhenRa]

Yeah, even if they weren't originally producing the ships entirely self-sufficiently? Given they would have some, they can build the rest of the required infrastructure themselves. And probably already have since the war went hot again.

[Simon_Jester]

Well, actually under hot war conditions it would make more sense to concentrate Bolthole's resources purely on building more ships, and on building the equipment to build ships. There is no longer the need to conceal the fact that Haven is building warships at all. So you might as well start producing refined materials (i.e. steel beams or whatever, and computer systems) in other systems and funneling them to Bolthole, because that way they can produce ships faster, and concentrate the limited workforce at Bolthole on what really matters.

[And one of the big limits on Bolthole almost has to be the workforce, because people who are there can't leave in any significant numbers... but at the same time, their communication with family and friends would have to be rather sharply curtailed. Granted, Haven has a very large population and can no doubt find a few million shipyard workers out of its hundreds of billions of people who are willing to work under those conditions. But finding more on demand is going to be difficult.

[Terralthra]

Forget finding more, you have to get the crews for your mighty warships out there somehow. Havenite navies never really went in for as much automation as Manticore did, since they didn't need it as much.

[Simon_Jester]

That's a factor too.

On the other hand, it's not hard to openly recruit Navy personnel, train them on the obsolete SDs and other starships left over from the first round of the war (Capital Fleet and Twelfth Fleet were both totally intact at war's end), and then pack them in a handful of relatively fast personnel transports. Fly them to Bolthole without telling them where they're going, hop into their new-built ships, and set sail.

No different from any other naval operation; the time you spend out of touch with the outside galaxy is at most several months, which has to be pretty normal for the Honorverse given just how long a long-range naval cruise can travel.

As long as nobody's allowed to take photographs of starscapes or anything dumb like that, it should work out just fine.