Re: Pirates, Privateers and Politics

>> The relationship between the AE and the OU is quite
>>interesting: a large proportion
>> of the AE actually resides in territory notionally claimed by
>>the OU.

>Now, there are a number of AE sovereignities dispersed throughout
>human space, and if you count "a star system with one ship or
>habitat" as "occupied" and if you regard as valid the OU's claim
>to every M star around, then I suppose you could say that most of
>the territory occupied by the AE is actually OU.

Exactly.

>Amazing, how those OU battlecruisers look _just like_ NSL
>battlecruisers. :-)

No, many of them look just like FSE Battlecruisers. Some of which were
actually
bought legitimately ( OK, so that's only 2 of them).

>>Of course sometimes
>>there are commercial disagreements, and it may be neccessary to
>>terminate the lease of an AE settlement that's becoming a public
>>nuisance. But this is more usually done by one of the big 4
>>getting OU agreement not to interfere in a little "hot pursuit",
>>other than to salvage any wreckage.

>it should also be pointed out that the last time
>the FSE sent a squadron into AE space--roughly 60 years ago,
>IIRC--rather less of it came back.

Not quite true. A lot of it came back to *someone*, just not the FSE.
(see above
re OUDF Battlecruisers). Vultures R Us got at least 2 ships too.

>The AE doesn't deal with the United Nations and doesn't recognize
>the UN as having any legal jurisdiction over anything whatsoever.
>And that's on the days when we're feeling polite....

But as they say in the classics, you can catch more flies with honey
than vinegar.
Or as they say in the OU Department of External Affairs, "Clausewitz
almost
had it right: State Policy is War carried out by other means." They're
big on
Sun Tsu too: "Hence to fight and conquer in all your battles is not
supreme
excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's
resistance without
fighting."

(Best translation of Sun Tsu is at
http://www.cnd.org:8000/Classics/Philosophers/Sun_Zi/Sun_Zi-10.txt.html
btw and for Clausewitz On War
http://www.clausewitz.com/CWZHOME/On_War/ONWARTOC.html
)