2008-09-12, 08:23 | Link #41 | |||||
I disagree with you all.
Join Date: Dec 2005
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No, they didn't. The UM quite clearly shot first. After years of tense peace in which the UM and its allies prepared for war against the Abh. Quote:
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They were never, however, programmed for conquest. Where did you get that? That's something they decided later. They started as a band of nomadic traders. After the discorvery of Plane Space, they decided that, as the only space natives, the spaceways should be theirs and no one else's. So they forbade the other people they came in contact with from researching Plane Space. However, what they hadn't counted on at the time, was that they weren't the first to discover Plane Space, and that other people got it before the Abh could get to them. What did they do, then? Nothing. Not counting their original sin, they've started one war in their multi-millenia long history. (The one against Jinto's planet.) (How does that fit with what I said about their ban on Plane Space research? Not sure. I may have to reread. Maybe they only count wars against space faring nations?) What's true is that they can't be reasoned with. Once the war's started, they'll finish it. On the other hand, they are content to continue peaceful diplomatic relations with the human nation that didn't fire at them, despite its alliance with the other three, so they're not completely unreasonable. |
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2008-09-12, 08:24 | Link #42 | ||||
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Still, you do have a point in that the author originally meant to make the story much more balanced between the Allies and the Abh, and that the Banner shows (and presumably the novels as well) go too far in glorifying the Abh. After all, I recall a line of dialogue where the Abh predicted the war to go on for one or two centuries, while the show itself shows off a series of uninterrupted Abh victories. To Morioka's credit, I've heard that he planned to write a novel (or short story) from the United Mankind's point of view. Quote:
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On a very different note, does any novel reader have any concrete estimates as to the size of the Abh wartime fleet? I've heard of numbers up to 100 million ships, but that seems very farfetched, especially since their maximum wartime output seems to be in the order of 50,000 ships per year.
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2008-09-12, 08:41 | Link #43 | ||
I disagree with you all.
Join Date: Dec 2005
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Not that I disagree with you on the expansion thing. There was something disingenuous about the Empress asking why the allies were discontent, when there were plenty of unexplored star systems inside their encirclement. Quote:
I remember Lafiel explaining something about how the Abh where never the aggressors, and Jinto saying that they were, against his planet, and her answering it was the first and only time it'd happened. |
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2008-09-12, 09:10 | Link #44 |
:cool:
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Age: 32
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Even with all that being said, I don't think the Abh are so interested in Galactic Domination these days.
First of all, they're getting good resistance. Secondly, the Abh never seem to be all that interested in controlling it all in Banner of the Stars. Especially in Banner of the Stars 2. Maybe it's just me, but I don't think that the plan stuck with the Abh through all this time. As far as the war goes, I'd say the Abh more than likely started it but mankind probably would've if they didn't. Even if the Abh had come in peace I suspect Xenophobia would've been a big factor. There's always going to be people who think aliens will just try to kill everyone. Edit: Oh, the Martine incident to my memory was started because Martine actually attacked the Abh. The Prime Minister that was in charge had the audacity to fire off planetary defense systems at the Abh. I think that's the reason for the hostile takeover and annex.
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2008-09-12, 09:11 | Link #45 | ||
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Spoiler for minor bit from the first novel:
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And then there are also lines like: Spoiler for minor bit from the first novel:
The Abh's explicit policy was to cut off the Allies from being expand further, and Hyde was the key to this. Their saving grace is that they had no intention of attacking the Allies themselves. But even there, the Allies were fully aware that the Humankind Empire's position would allow it to grow stronger while their own growth potential was stifled. If the Empire changed its mind at a date far in the future, they wouldn't be able to resist it any more. One thing to note here is that all of the nations think according to very long term goals - often a century or more in the future.
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2008-09-12, 09:31 | Link #46 | |
I disagree with you all.
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During the first invasion, the planetary defenses were never fired. Jinto's father negotiated their surrender - which was one more source of discontent. |
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2008-09-12, 09:42 | Link #47 | |
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2008-09-12, 10:20 | Link #48 |
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No provocation? The Martine defenses are extremely short-ranged, so the Abh ship had to come very close to the planet itself to be anywhere within range. In and of itself, approaching so close without annoucing diplomatic intentions poses a threat to the planet below and is casus belli for attacking said craft. Note that the Abh themselves never brought this incident up as an excuse for their invasion.
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2008-09-12, 10:40 | Link #49 |
Dango Master
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Why are you people trying to justify what the Abh did by changing the facts ..... They DID start the war when they discovered Planar Space and started conquering everything they found. Xenophobia or whatever the reason the rest of the galaxy tried to fight the Abh back was in retaliation.
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2008-09-12, 10:55 | Link #50 |
I disagree with you all.
Join Date: Dec 2005
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Uh... Other war. Thousands of years before. All five remaining countries (the Abh and the four allies) have indulged in that sort of things to get where they are.
What you're saying is a bit like "the Romans conquered most of Europe. So Russia, China, and the USA are perfectly justified if they want to invade Italy now." |
2008-09-12, 11:13 | Link #51 | |
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2008-09-12, 11:28 | Link #52 | |
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Is it not a fairly standard proceedure to give clear warnings before firing in such situations? When a SINGLE enemy craft enters your airspace, you don't just blindly shoot it down when you are not in a declared state of war. You issue warnings and if it fails to comply THEN you shoot at it. |
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2008-09-12, 11:30 | Link #53 | |
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2008-09-12, 11:55 | Link #54 | |||
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In modern terms, if Georgia were to fly one of their mility aircraft over Russian airspace without permission, Russia is fully justified in shooting it down without giving any warnings whatsoever. That's definitely one of the points that Morioka was trying to make in the Crest of the Stars novels. I get the feeling that a lot of it was lost in the subsequent works because so much of the focus was from the Abh point of view.
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2008-09-12, 12:15 | Link #55 | ||
I disagree with you all.
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And you could say the same about the UM. They've been shown to be a lot more invasive about what goes on on the ground than the Abh have any interest in being. They're not as all conquering as you describe them. If you already have Plane Travel and don't aggress them, in theory, they won't aggress you. Quote:
- The allies are innocent of it. - The conquered people have any relation to the allies. |
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2008-09-12, 12:28 | Link #56 |
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Will you knock it off the with this "Gods will" wordplay bullfuckery already? The Abhs are stated numerous times to be atheist in the series, they do not follow anysort of faith-based religious philosphy whatsoever.
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2008-09-12, 12:35 | Link #57 | |||
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Join Date: Feb 2008
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About the only folly the UM made was to try to frame Lafiel's mum for starting the war. There was no need for that dishonesty, since the Abh were a self-admitted threat to everyone's soverignty. Quote:
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2008-09-12, 12:37 | Link #58 | |
Style Über Alles
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2008-09-12, 12:54 | Link #59 | |
Not Enough Sleep
Join Date: Nov 2003
Location: R'lyeh
Age: 48
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It is also the reason the reason why in Book 4 Spoiler:
anyone know if TP will continue on with the rest of the Seikai series or are they stopping at Seikai2?
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Last edited by Xellos-_^; 2008-09-12 at 13:04. |
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2008-09-12, 16:03 | Link #60 | |||
I disagree with you all.
Join Date: Dec 2005
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However, all in all, their yoke is pretty light. Their rules: - maintain order. The Abh would rather not have to do it. - have a representative to speak with Empire. Annoying to those with a parliamentary regime and no single head of state, true. Or worse, multinational planets. For people who already have a planetary President, or Pope, or King, or whatever, it's pretty much business as usual. - said representative may not advocate secession from the Empire. (Common citizens, OTOH, can.) - the Empire get monopoly on interstellar trade. If you didn't even have interstellar travel before, you're no worse off. - the Empire has monopoly on interstellar ships. - intrasystem ships are allowed only as long as they're unarmed. - construction of a recruiting office for the Star Force. Those who want to volunteer may not be hindered, but there's no conscription, no demand of a quota. I'm not saying it's nothing, but they largely leave the ground well enough alone. Spoiler for novel:
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